Speed Kills

It may be a combination of things converging all at once, be it Obama's relatively youthful exuberance and his desire to succeed immediately, coupled with his lack of experience in actual accomplishment, or it could be interpreted as something far more sinister, such as a diabolical plan for the ultimate ruination of America. Which, I am incapable of discerning, which is why I write. Mine is a mission of thought provocation, designed to stimulate the thought processes of the reader and to trigger cognizance. To be honest, if you're already reading here, you are pre-engaged anyway.

We have all seen the billboards prominently displayed on the roads across America, the ones with the [whichever] State Trooper propped up against his patrol car, speaking into his radio mic, and the words "Speed Kills" just above or below the picture. Those are ad campaigns designed to get drivers to slow down and reduce road fatalities.

More often than not it is the driver who is killed, along with any passengers who may be on board. So it is with Obama driving a bus loaded with giddy congressional Democrats, feeling as invincible as the teen just embarking on life's journey. Their current domination of the political process is responsible for that feeling, and they can't envision the bus slamming into a tree at high velocity.

Somehow mesmerized by Obama, Democrats are so eager to pass dubious and disastrous health care reform this year that they are poised to commit political suicide. How they cannot see this is incomprehensible, for even if they do nothing else this year, they are still facing trouble in 2010, according to Charlie Cook, who is already predicting a possible net loss in the House of Representatives in excess of 20 seats.

Of course, Congress never does "do nothing", and Democrats have a peculiar penchant for self-inflicted wounds, so it is small wonder that they are preparing for triage. Since Obama has successfully ginned up Democrats with the promise of finally reaching their long-sought after goal of social utopia, i.e., Universal Health Care, they have become blinded by their pending euphoria.

Attempting to assuage the concerns of the people over the cost of reform - I prefer to call it lying - Obama is presenting himself as fiscally responsible by insisting that his plan for health care will be "deficit neutral". People, however, particularly those at Tea Parties and Town Halls, know that all that means is that someone is going to have to pay for it. If you are broke but still want that $5,000 home theater system, and you refuse to go into debt to get it, the only option is to receive it as a gift or...have someone else pay for it.

Perhaps he's been deliberately desensitizing the people to his numerous broken promises in the hope that by the time he breaks the promise of no new taxes, we'll be so used to it that his loss of political capital will be minute. Since government is certainly not going to receive health care reform as a gift, that means that they'll need someone else to pay for it; that would be us.

Completing the recipe for disaster, the Democrats are inching closer to employing the "nuclear option", whereby the majority party locks the opposition out of the process. In other words, Democrats are preparing to ram universal health care down our throats all by themselves without Republicans voting, thus owning the debacle. That is something the people will remember in an election year and something the Republicans will be sure to remind us of next year.

Such an act of betrayal by elected officials will most assuredly make Charlie Cook's current estimate look extremely conservative in scope.

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