As we journey further into the political dreamworld of the progressives, their nature becomes even more apparent to anyone bothering to pay attention.  Nancy Pelosi’s statements tend to be particularly revealing, using language like “we are making progress for working Americans” and “we will pass this bill at all costs”.  If that kind of speech doesn’t make their nature and agenda crystal clear, what would?  The Democratic Party is under the spell of Marxists willing to do anything they can to advance their agenda.  The ends justify the means.

On top of everything else, Joe Biden let one slip, stating as a matter of fact that “you know we are going to control the insurance industry”.  The agenda and its consequences should be clear to us now – unless America is too busy making brackets for March Madness.  I think informed Americans have no love for the kind of total government that is headed our way.  But unfortunately that is the question:  are we busy watching basketball and American Idol?  This is a test for our Republic, and it will determine if we are worthy to carry on the great experiment that the founding fathers started not that long ago.  The United States is the greatest and most noble endeavour in the history of mankind, but we must now make a choice if we are going to use the gifts it gives us to preserve the light of liberty in the world — or to ensure everyone has a new TV, new car, and healthcare for all.  This is a battle for the soul of America.  Treating it as anything less would be to turn a blind eye to history and common sense.

One of the “personal stories” that the president used to illustrate the need for his healthcare bill was a woman who had cancer and was “faced with losing her home that had been in her family for 50 years” (something that turned out not to be true).  She was spending about $10,000 per year on health insurance (assumedly due to a pre-existing condition), and so when she was faced with a possible 40% increase in her premium for 2010, she dropped the coverage, soon after which she got Luekemia.  My question is this:  how much is your life worth to you?  Is your continued survival on this planet worth selling your house and moving into a smaller one, or foregoing a new car or vacation?  Certainly, this is a sad story, and most everyone can agree that prohibitively expensive healthcare is a serious problem in America that should be dealt with.  But the real question is, when someone has the assets to pay for their healthcare but chooses not to because it would create severe disruption to their standard of living, what exactly is it that we are subsidizing when we pay the bill for her?  Are we subsidizing her right to healthcare, or her right to live a comfortable life in the house she inherited from her parents?  When the government gets into the business of subsidizing the comfort level of its citizens (and of course our government has already been in that business for quite a while, because it buys votes) beware — a government that gives can take away.

Whether you’re religious and want to say our rights come directly from God, or a skeptic who believes that rights are inherent to the state of being human, I don’t care.  But the one place we must absolutely not get our rights from is the government.

• We do not have a right to healthcare.
• We do not have the right to a comfortable home.
• We do not have the right to rely on others to sustain our livelihood.

When a woman asked Ben Franklin what kind of government they had created for America he replied “A Republic, madam, if you can keep it.”  Now is the time in America’s history where we decide whether we want to keep it, or not.  The Republic that has been gifted to us is not a foregone conclusion.  We as Americans can trade it for the idle promises of the progressives and the lure of being “taken care of” by a benevolent totalitarianism.  It remains to be seen which path we are going to choose.

For those willing to fight for liberty and our Republic, take heart.  The passing of this healthcare bill is only one shot in one battle in a war that will be fought for as long as the dream of liberty exists in the mind of just one person.

We promise, universal healthcare will only cost this many money

Such a “universal” [healthcare] system has been the core liberal aspiration since the age of Bismarck. But time and again this political ambition has been thwarted by American individualism, distrust of government power, the checks and balances of the political system, and, every so often, good judgment in Washington.

Presidents have a right to certain prerogatives, including the expectation of a certain deference. He’s the president, this is history. But we seem to have come a long way since Ronald Reagan was regularly barked at by Sam Donaldson, almost literally, and the president shrugged it off. The president—every president—works for us. We don’t work for him. We sometimes lose track of this, or rather get the balance wrong. Respect is due and must be palpable, but now and then you have to press, to either force them to be forthcoming or force them to reveal that they won’t be. Either way it’s revealing.

Make certain you hear Howard Cossell (around 3:50) breathlessly describe an errant baton pass between Valerie Bertinelli and Lou Ferrigno, with no detectable irony in his voice. Listen, also, to the most perfectly unintelligible English ever spoken– by an out-of-breath Ferrigo.

Of course, none of these sprintin’ celebs stands a chance against a rollerskating porn star/collectivist metaphor.

Here a 16- or 17-year old Chilton performs the Box Tops’ hit “The Letter”:

A standoff has been heating up for months. The paper, which has experienced significant revenue declines in recent years, has been pushing for labor cost reductions while Guild members have fought to maintain or improve their wages and benefits.

In February, the Guild allocated $500,000 for a possible public relations campaign against Lee. The union said it would launch its marketing blitz if the company terminates the workers’ contract and imposes wage and benefit cuts.

Squeezing a dying enterprise for more money to finance negative marketing campaigns against said enterprise. Sounds like a winning plan!

And why do we have to pay for bread at all? We need basic foods to survive, far more urgently than we need health insurance. Maybe it would be better if the government took over the bread industry. Think of all the money wasted on packaging and advertising, which could be saved if the State distributed Obama Bread in plain white wrappers that said RYE or WHEAT in simple block lettering. Our wise politicians could then decide if all those different varieties of bread are truly necessary.

If you have studied the history of socialism and communism around the world, you know what the inevitable results of a nationalized bread industry would be: hungry people staring at dusty shelves containing a few expensive loaves of low-quality bread. Humanity has invented few weapons that kill people more efficiently than collectivist agriculture.

‘Obamacare’ health care reform (see contract rules) to become law before midnight ET 30 Jun 2010

Via Instapundit.