Obama-Care is Coming...

This is slightly old news -- but in the light of the recent developments concerning the rise of swine flu, the facts are now even more concerning than they were before. Last week, Fox News ran a story discussing Democrats' use of a parliamentary procedure known as "reconciliation" to push through Health Care legislation under rules that do not require a cloture vote in the Senate. Now, to be honest, I don't know the details of the specific legislation in question. This may be the full Obama-Care we were promised during the campaign or something less. But, the details of the legislation don't matter much. The fact is, they are shoving this legislation through in a manner that limits debate, and virtually eliminates the possibility that the minority would be able to block it, amend it, or propose alternatives to it.

Have no doubt that Democrats on Capitol Hill remember what happened to Hillary Clinton's Health Care plan more than a decade ago, when she was merely married to the President. And they are not so dumb as to fail to learn from the past. (A brief refresher: She released a ton of details on her plan, and they were available for public scrutiny for quite some time. Needless to say, the availability of clear information gave opponents plenty of ammunition to defeat the measure during debate.) Being clever enough to learn from the past, today's Democrats will not repeat the same mistake. Given the fact that this legislation is very controversial, it will be pushed through rapidly, with minimal debate.

Now, consider that analysis in conjunction with the seeming newfound panic over this Swine Flu, and remember the mantra of Rahm Emanuel (White House Chief of Staff):

You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.

Believe me: If this serious situation escalates into a full-blown crisis, I can guarantee you that it will be used to induce a panicked claim that we "need" to Nationalize Health Care NOW, just like Congress "needed" to pass a 1000+ page Stimulus bill less than 8 hours after its language had even been agreed-upon, without so much as 5 hours of debate. We've already seen the Obama Administration's masterful use of panic-induced urgency to shove bad laws down our throats without debate. I don't know about you, but it sure leaves a bad taste in my mouth. This one, unlike the stimulus bill, is not too late to stop.