And the confirmation hearings continue. The biggest priority? Urging senators to block the nomination of Tom Price for Secretary of Health and Human Services.
The two biggest issues:
First, he’s a fervent opponent of the Affordable Care Act who wants to privatize and thus undermine Medicare. His plan for an ACA “replacement” is a joke. (For more, see here.)
Second, he has also engaged in what looks and awful lot like insider trading. Price reportedly invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in stocks of health-related firms … while promoting legislation that would help these firms. This is the sort of thing that people go to jail for (Martha Stewart, anyone?), and it’s outrageous that Republicans are trying to push his confirmation through before these charges are investigated. (For more on his ethics issues see here.)
For broader overviews of these and other issues with Price, see here and here.
So get calling! Or emailing!
You can find contact info for your senators here.
You can find out if they’re on the Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee (the committee he’s testifying before) here.
See my posts here and here for information and advice on how to make your calls and emails effective. If making these sorts of calls is tough for you, here’s some advice on calling politicians if you have social anxiety.
And while you’re at it, tell your senators — and congresspeople — to urge them to oppose the GOP’s attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act. (See my post here.)
Also. encourage them to boycott Trump’s inauguration. (See my post here.)
Trump isn’t even trying to hide his corrupt agenda. Price is quite literally a corporate crony.
It’s interesting to note that every single one of his appointments engaged in the most transparently obvious question-dodging we’ve seen to this date. Carson was the worst.
from CNN
Resist!!
Price says he doesn’t know what stocks he has… well, bunky, as a legislator dealing daily with possible conflicts of interest, dontcha think you should’a CHECKED???
Trump selects a new advisor–a man who is being sued for being a racist shitbag.
What happened to Steve Bannon?
Bannon appears to still be one of Trump’s minions. There’s always room for more kaka in the kakacracy!
Steve’s not nasty enough? 😉
@Lindsay I find it amazing/maddening that ‘kakacracy’ is so similar to a real word ‘kakocracy’, which means pretty much the same thing. 🙂 Thanks, ancient Greeks! 🙂 (Maddening because this shit has been happening for millenia!)
I should have said ‘existing word’.
@Fishy Goat
Kakistocracy is how I’ve usually seen it written.
EDIT: NM, just saw your comment on the DeVos thread.
My Senator’s on the committee. Talked to a very bored staffer about Price’s bullshit and Obamacare
Re: Bannon
Does this mean he’s been demoted?
He’s a surgeon. Oh, boy.
Old hospital joke: What’s the difference between God and a surgeon? God doesn’t think He’s a surgeon.
It doesn’t look like Bannon’s going anywhere, The president has multiple advisor positions that can be filled with ambulatory trash bags.
Not everyone has a dollar to their name
And voices have been elevated to fame
By saying the penniless deserve shame
For not engaging in a corporate game.
There are those out there owning more than all the small combined
And for some mysterious reason they want more, more, more
It couldn’t have been long before their interests intertwined
And money started being stored offshore
When one has so much, and many others have so little,
Wouldn’t it make sense to let those above give to the below?
But according to the election, that idea’s got little affection
So those without may as well have been lined up in a row
@Lindsay,
I remember the whole thing about Power and Light a few years ago. The crowd there is an island of white in a sea of multiculturalism.
Off topic, but @Fishy Goat – are you, by chance, a Capricorn?
@LindsayIrene:
Sounds like he should get along just fine with Trump, whose father after all spent a lot of time trying to make sure black people would never be shown or sold any of his ‘good’ places.
FBI, 5 other agencies probe possible covert Kremlin aid to Trump
One possible problem with this:
Everyone sings Steele’s praises, but he seems a bit lax on the fact-checking.
@ dreemr Yup. 🙂
@Dalillama Oh shoot, did I remember it wrong? *headdesk*
Thanks for indulging me, @Fishy Goat
*Capricorn hoof-bump
Greek grammar nerdery: “Kakocracy” means “rule of the bad”, “kakistocracy” means “rule of the worst” (and thus the opposite of the rather optimistic meaning of “aristocracy”, “rule of the best”).
@Fishy Goat & Dali
Both are correct, kakistocracy is the superlative for kakocracy. So in this case, it definitely applies.