Allen, AFP: Hands off health care
Led by former Virginia Gov. and U.S. Sen. George Allen, an Americans for Prosperity bus rolled into Waynesboro on Friday morning with a simple message for the federal government: keep your hands off our health care.
Allen, speaking before a shivering crowd gathered outside Waynesboro City Hall, said if federalized health care is passed it will mean “all the negatives – more taxes, more restrictions, more dictates and for those on Medicare – cuts.”
Allen said Americans want freedom and the solution is health savings accounts and high deductible insurance policies.
“My whole family is in health savings accounts,’’ said Allen, who explained the accounts can move with the insurance holders from job to job.
Allen said the direction of the federal government is toward runaway spending that will only be accelerated by federal health care.
“This debt has to be paid off and it will cause inflation and higher interest rates,’’ he said. “It’s not just the debt. Here is a federal government bailing out auto companies and banks and taking them over.”
Allen told the crowd to contact Sens. Mark Warner and Jim Webb and send the message “we don’t want taxes and dictates. We want personal empowerment and health care that is affordable, versatile and high quality.”
State Sen. Ken Cuccinelli, the Republican nominee for Virginia attorney general, told the crowd that health savings accounts are “a great application of free market principles.”
Cuccinelli said the same freedom that led to the founding of the United States in 1776 is just as important today.
“Freedom is not unimportant in all these discussions,’’ Cuccinelli said. “That is the reason some of us beat on the first principles.’’
Cuccinelli said he has proposed legislation to allow Virginians to buy health care across state lines. The legislation has not been successful. Cuccinelli said the prohibition is “ludicrous.”
He said only one state that borders Virginia has more expensive health care costs than the commonwealth.
Ben Marchi, the Virginia state director of Americans for Prosperity, said the bus tour includes much of Virginia and states where legislators are on the fence about federal health care.
He urged the crowd to get the message to Warner and Webb.
“We have to put pressure on Jim Webb and Mark Warner,’’ he said. “If we don’t, we face the biggest government power grab in our lifetime.”
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Lyon I am not a constitutional scholar, but my opinion is where it talks about the “general welfare”.
I’ve been on many a committee in my day to address issues. We get people directly involved on the committees to provide input and help solve the problem.
Congress gets a group a lawyers together to fix a problem.
Where were the doctors, hospital administers, insurance reps, patients, etc in these negotiations? I guess their input wasn’t necessary.
Government has no expertise and no business in health care.
I’m still trying to find the section in the Constitution where they have the authority to mandate health care.
Can you find it for me Bear5?
Just seen a van load of those death panel people go by the house. Be careful they may be coming for you!
I am sure that the stock market would have been a great investment.
Get ready, government health care is on the way! Good!!!!
If anyone remembers Social security was begun as a voluntary program. By the Democrats/Socialists.
Then the money was supposed to be kept separate in a “lockbox” when it became mandatory.
So said the Democrats/Socialists.
And now we are supposed to trust them with Health Care? The Democrats/Socialists?
I’m tired of this useless thread, too, particularly when it gets reduced to meaningless insults. Anyway, confirming facts are easy to find, the point being that AFP is a well-funded national organization, meant to look line a grassroots organization. The following is from the Wall Street Journal:
The group was formed in the split of conservative Citizens for a Sound Economy, with one faction establishing FreedomWorks, led by former House Speaker Dick Armey, and the other, Americans for Prosperity. Both are driving the opposition to the proposed health-care overhaul. Some of the group’s funding comes from David H. Koch, co-owner of oil-and-gas company Koch Industries Inc., whose net worth is estimated at around $20 billion. Americans for Prosperity said it received $14.5 million in contributions in 2008. Some of its earlier activism included rallying opposition to the country’s dependence on foreign oil and organizing so-called tea parties. Timothy Phillips, the 45-year-old GOP strategist from South Carolina who leads the six-year-old organization, said his group was only one of many that are urging members to speak out. When it comes to health care, Mr. Phillips outlined a straightforward strategy: Americans for Prosperity looked at every town hall scheduled by lawmakers across the country. It flagged the group’s members within 100 miles of each event, and enlisted local representatives in each area.
Are you denying the accuracy of anything I posted or just ranting?
This has absolutly nothing to do with the ex-Senator’s AFP-sponsored bus-tour visit to W’boro. “LiberalsLie” is cleverly pulling this thread off topic, but judge for yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rush_Limbaugh
Oh, come on. Wikipedia is a basic, neutral source of information with attributions to real sources—up for challenge if something seem inaccurate.
Love your unbiased username, by the way.
Americans for Prosperity is one of the groups involved in organizing “town hall protests” and “recess rallies.“ It conducts bus tours around the country to create opposition to health care. Its participants also have been encouraged to attend public forums and are prompted to shout down speakers. Americans for Prosperity sometimes passes out pre-made, hand-made signs at rallies to give the appearance of “grassroots” participation. The AFP is the third largest recipient of funding from the Koch Family Foundations whose money comes from oil interests, primarily oil refining. Media Transparency notes that Americans for Prosperity Foundation received grants totaling $1,181,000 between 2004 and 2006. In its 2007 IRS return, the AFP Foundation’s revenue was $5,695,000. Of its expenditure, just over $2.9 million was allocated to state-based chapters. AFP also advocates pro-tobacco industry positions on issues like cigarette taxes and clean indoor air laws. AFP was one of the lead organizations behind the Tax Day Tea Party protests April 15, 2009, closely tied to Fox News and commentator Glenn Beck. (Sources, among others: Wikepedia, SourceWatch)
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