YEGPARIAN: GOEBBELS, MASSACHUSETTS, AND HEALTHCARE
By Garen Yegparian

Armenian Weekly
February 4, 2010

Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, is famously noted to
have said something to the effect of, "Repeat a lie enough times and
it becomes the truth."

That’s part of what happened in Massachusetts. The Republican
candidate, and now Senator-elect, Scott Brown played to people’s fear.

In this case, fear of the unknown. The Republican Party, for at least
three decades now, has become expert at manipulating people through
fear instead of hope. In this case, they created the source of fear,
then used it to defeat the opponent-someone who, by all accounts, ran
a poor campaign. Republicans made sure that healthcare legislation
aiming for universal coverage (something which is already the law
in Massachusetts and enjoys an 80 percent approval rating) became a
hideously convoluted proposal. Then they started using that against
Democrats. The "2,000-page bill" has become the right-wing wackos’
rallying cry. It does seem like a lot. But has anyone bothered to
ask, or publicize, how long typical bills are? Most address smaller
issues and are not the object of concerted partisan attack on a par
with what "healthcare reform" has been subjected to. So Republicans
created a bogeyman, attached it to the Dems, made it stick (repeated
the lie enough times), used their fear-mongering expertise, availed
themselves of a weak candidate, and won an unprecedented victory in
one of the most Democratic of states.

What next? Well, a better question is, "What else?" A deal cut by the
Democratic and Republican leaders of the U.S. Senate, Harry Reid and
Mitch McConnell, respectively, would have enabled the healthcare bill
to pass without Republicans being able to game it, offering endless
amendments to stave off its passage, as they did when Bill Clinton
was in office. You see, Republicans are counting on its passage
so they can campaign against Democrats on the grounds of repealing
"Obamacare," as they derogatorily refer to it. Please read Lawrence
O’Donnell’s "Will Scott Brown Ruin Republicans’ (Secret) Plan to Pass
Obamacare?" written before the election, for the details on this ploy
( l-scott-brown-ruin-rep_b_426604.html).

The depth of cynicism is truly galling.

So what now? Now that the Democrats have lost their so-called
filibuster-proof majority, the bill can’t pass the Senate. It’s only
hope for passage is if the House votes for the Senate’s version of
the bill with no changes. Then it goes to the president, he signs
it, and we move on. But pulling this off means lots of Democratic
Representatives would have to vote for legislation that is even more
anathema to them then what they’ve stomached so far.

I say, call the Republicans out on the carpet. Expose their
shenanigans. Let them vote healthcare down. In fact, ditch the current
bills (the House and Senate versions) and put a single payer plan
out there, specifically the gradually-age-expanding-Medicare approach
(make it available to ever younger people over some length of time).

Let them vote that proposal down. Some Democratic legislators will
foolishly join their Republican colleagues. Let those guys go down
in flames come November 2010, and use those same bonfires to cook
the Republicans opposed to providing proper healthcare to everyone
in the richest country in the world.

Let’s see who wins an election fought on that battlefield.

We as a community with issues before the federal government should
learn from this. The arcane rules of the legislative bodies can
trip us up-badly-if we don’t learn and know them. Interestingly,
Bill Paparian writes analogously in his recent piece published by
Armenian Life. Adam Schiff used these parliamentary tools to our
benefit, almost three years ago. But more often, they have worked to
our detriment. That’s why we need to master them, not least by having
strong representation. Hopefully, that will be provided someday by
a legislator who is truly a child of our community.

Let’s learn and train. That day can’t be too far off.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress