Last night after being perstinantly nagged by many a blogger claiming I wasn’t informed enough to have an opinion on HR 3200 aka Obamacare aka Kennedy care or whatever it is called these days, I decided to hit the books if you would and peruse the 1018 page PDF on the internet. I wanted to prove to those know it alls that Ballew is in fact as informed if not more informed than they.
As I started the long process of reading this mammoth bill I realized that this could “take a while” but me being the persistent person I am I kept to the task. At first it seemed this task was going to be easily achieved. Hell, how many 1000 + page books have I read right? Then it hit me around page 20ish, I don’t recall ever reading a book 1000+ pages long. But like a good troop deciding that I would not let that deter me I soldiered on.
As I got to page 50 or so it dawned on me that I have not retained any of what I had read and that maybe soldiering on here was not a good idea. I was being bombarded with all this legal and political jargon that I doubt even those who authored this bill (whomever that may be) didn’t completly grasp. And that for some reason even at page 50 or so I had a feeling I read further into it than many in Congress, who get paid the big buck to read this stuff, had read into this bill. I realized at that moment the futility of trying to swallow this 1018 page mammoth. Eventually I come to realize that it should not be me trying to disuade people from believing in this bill, no instead it should be the up to the Congress who want to pass this bill to sell it to us.
What gets me about many of those who support HR 3200 is the fact many of them expect people to just let it go without a fight. Especially when our Congress knows little about this bill or are just playing dumb and not disclosing information. That coupled with the fact the speed and lack of bipartisan support only weakens their stance. Many Americans, to include yours truly, are leery about this bill and the affect it will have in our lives. On top of all that and we get the cost of the bill and the lack of information on how they plan on getting the money to pay for it. All this has lead many Americans to fight against this bill tooth and nail. That is why I feel these townhalls are so important. And although at times these events can become rowdy the average American deserves a voice in this matter. And although the Democrats have an upper hand in this I feel in the end whether HR 3200 passes or not this will be “teachable” moment in history. Hopefully Americans learn that if we can’t trusts these yahoos to read and understand a bill of this magnitude how can we trust them to do the right thing?And someday soon maybe Americans will realize the politicians work for us not the opposite.
I do plan to keep reading the bill when time permits. It is a rather dry and not much action but I do want to be one of the informed few it just might take me a little longer than most.
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It isn’t up to citizens to be reading bills for congress. Thats what they get paid for. On the flip side, they owe us a summary bill without the legal mumbo jumbo.
Of late, I have been thinking how much better this country would be if elected officials only met once a month for 3 days. The remaining 27 would be spent working in real jobs.
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Rob – one thing that stands out here is your correct notion that supporters of this bill expect everyone else to bend over and take it. Why should you read the bill? They didn’t! Even worse is that they didn’t AND they are 100% behind it. Not supporting something out of ignorance is one thing – supporting it out of ignorance is something completely different.
Good luck. Maybe you could take notes and write your own summary. Get back to us in 2011 when it’s complete. ;o)
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Max – I agree there should be a summary made accessible minus the legal garbage. The fact is for me reading this bill is a lot like having 2 years of high school French and trying to read a French novel. I understand a lot of the words but they just don’t come together well.
OttO – I couldn’t agree with you more it was amazing to me how many of the supporters shut their mouths as soon as I asked the question “what makes this bill better than what we have now?” After that all I got was crickets.
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Hey Rob… I gotta admire you for at least trying to read it. While I enjoyed beating up Congressman Conyers for stating he didn’t see any point reading the Bill since it would require 2 lawyers to interpret it for him, I gotta hand it to him for his blatant honesty. It just speaks very poorly of the congress and how they write legislation. Now there is a real problem that needs fixed.
And to all the liberal hypocrite bloggers who accused you of being ill informed on HR 3200, you read 50 pages more than they did. They can go suck eggs.
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