Tea Party Hypocrisy on Limited Government

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Keep in mind, these are the same people who use the full weight of the government at both the state and federal level to intervene in one of the most private and personal matters a woman decides, the use of birth control or the termination of a pregnancy in cosultation with her physician. In legislatures and courts across the country, for decades, the so-called "right to life" (forced birth) fundamentalists have sought to enact their religious creed into law to require people of all other faiths, or no faith, to follow their religious creed by force of law and punishment. No "freedom" from government intervention for you!

These are the same people who used the full weight of the government at both the state and federal level to intervene in the most private and personal matter anyone will ever face, the death of a loved one, i.e., the Terri Schiavo case. Congress held a special session on Palm Sunday in March 2005 to pass S. 686, legislation that would allow a federal court to review the case of Terri Schiavo, for the purpose of ordering a feeding tube reinserted after her husband had decided to end extraordinary measures to prolong her life. Terry Schiavo died on March 31, 2005. An autopsy later  "showed that her brain was severely "atrophied," weighed less than half of what it should have, and that no treatment could have reversed the damage." Schiavo's Brain Was Severely Deteriorated, Autopsy Says – New York Times.

These are the same people for whom GOP wordsmith Frank Luntz invented the talking point "death panels" to use to falsely describe a provision of the Health Care Reform Act that merely provides individuals the right to insurance coverage for end of life counseling from a medical professional and  advice on living wills and medical power of attorney. (The real "death panels" are insurance company denial of care committees). The "guvmint" was going to interfere with their "freedom" to receive that "socialist" Medicare, the teabaggers loudly proclaimed.

There is no greater power that the government exercises than to commit its citizens to death, either in battle during a war, or the execution of prisoners.

Yet at the NBC-MSNBC/Politico presidential debate teabaggers cheered wildly at the fact that Governor Goodhair Rick Perry has executed more prisoners than any governor in history — including juveniles and the mentally disabled, Rick Perry’s Execution Record Includes The Deaths Of Juveniles And The Mentally Disabled | ThinkProgress, and at least one individual the evidence clearly demonstrates was innocent. Cameron Todd Willingham – Innocent and Executed. These are people who reject William Blackstone's Formulation: "Better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" (the presumption of innocence in criminal trials). They prefer "Kill 'em all! Let God sort 'em out."

At the TeaNN (formerly CNN)/Koch Brothers' Tea Party Express debate, Ron Paul was asked a hypothetical question about a 30 year old man in good health who chose not to purchase health insurance who then suffers an illness or accident and winds up in a coma for six months. "Should the state pay his bills?" Wolf Blitzer asked? Paul responded, "That's what freedom is all about: taking your own risks. This whole idea that you have to take care of everybody—"

Paul never finished his point, drowned out by the teabagger audience's applause. Blitzer pressed him if he meant that "society should just let him die," to which the teabagger audience shouted "YEAH!" and loudly applauded with approving hoots and hollers. For most observers who still have an ounce of human decency in them, this was a chilling moment. Paul suggested that it would be up to churches to care for the dying man.

This question to Ron Paul, who is a medical doctor, was not so hypothetical. The man who initially made his presidential ambitions a reality died without medical insurance and in debt from end of life care. Which begs the question, "Where was Dr. Paul's Christian charity for his dying friend?" He's a medical doctor, for chrissake — what about his Hippocratic Oath? This is damning. Ron Paul's Campaign Manager Died of Pneumonia, Penniless and Uninsured:

As it turns out, Paul was not speaking purely in hypotheticals. Back in 2008, Kent Snyder — Paul's former campaign chairman — died of complications from pneumonia. Like the man in Blitzer's example, the 49-year-old Snyder (pictured) was relatively young and seemingly healthy* when the illness struck. He was also uninsured. When he died on June 26, 2008, two weeks after Paul withdrew his first bid for the presidency, his hospital costs amounted to $400,000. The bill was handed to Snyder's surviving mother (pictured, left), who was incapable of paying. Friends launched a website to solicit donations.

According to the Wall Street Journal's 2008 story on his death, Snyder was more than just a strategic ally: He was the only reason Paul thought he ever had a shot at the presidency in the first place.

"It was Kent more than anyone else who encouraged and pushed Ron to run for president," said Jesse Benton, a spokesman for Mr. Paul. "Ron would not have run for the presidency if it had not been for Kent. Ron was really hesitant, but Kent drove him forward."

And so, what started in February 2007 with one laptop in Snyder's Arlington, Va., apartment, quickly grew into a $35 million campaign employing 250 people. In the fourth quarter of that year, Snyder raised a stunning $19.5 million for Paul — more than any other Republican candidate had raised at the time.

After Snyder's death, Paul posted a message to the website for his Campaign for Liberty — a pre-Tea Party organization which served Paul as both presidential marketing tool and platform to promote his non-interventionist, free market ideals.

He wrote:

"Like so many in our movement, Kent sacrificed much for the cause of liberty. Kent poured every ounce of his being into our fight for freedom. He will always hold a place in my heart and in the hearts of my family."

And that, friends, is what freedom is really all about.

Think Progress adds:

On June 26, 2008, exactly two weeks after Paul ended his bid for the presidency, Synder passed away due to complications from his pneumonia. Snyder experienced Paul’s world of free market health care, a peculiar system that distinguishes the United States as the only Western country that does not provide basic care to its citizens. A look back at the charity effort launched to save Snyder’s life reveals a grim failure. Despite Paul’s insistence that charity is the appropriate response to America’s uninsured crisis, Snyder’s friends raised $34,870.53, far short of the $400,000 necessary to pay his bills.

In reading these articles I see that Ron Paul is running another "money bomb" Internet ad today. Where was he when his dying friend needed him? Where was he when his friend's family needed him? He had the money, and he is a medical doctor. Where was/is his Christian charity? This is the true face of the Tea Party.