Paglia on PelosiCare: Holy Hygeia!

Camille Paglia dismantles HR 3962 and tosses the pieces to the four winds.

Holy Hygeia, why can't my fellow Democrats see that the creation of another huge, inefficient federal bureaucracy would slow and disrupt the delivery of basic healthcare and subject us all to a labyrinthine mass of incompetent, unaccountable petty dictators?

Jennifer Rubin does the column justice so I'll refer you to her rather than replicate her excerpts. But here's one she omitted:

A second issue souring me on this bill is its failure to include the most common-sense clause to increase competition and drive down prices: portability of health insurance across state lines. What covert business interests is the Democratic leadership protecting by stopping consumers from shopping for policies nationwide? Finally, no healthcare bill is worth the paper it's printed on when the authors ostentatiously exempt themselves from its rules. The solipsistic members of Congress want us peons to be ground up in the communal machine, while they themselves gambol on in the flowering meadow of their own lavish federal health plan. Hypocrites! [emphasis added]

It just kills that portability, a simple and effective reform, is not even a glint in the eye of the Dem reformers. If proof were needed that this isn't about extending, improving, and lowering the cost of health insurance coverage, this would be it.

As for Paglia's "hypocrites," I don't like that word much, because no human being is 100% consistent, but Paglia's use of it here is what it was made for. Toss "arrogant" (and shameless) in front of it and you've got the whole picture.

Ms. Rubin sums things up thusly:

Well, there you have it: an economically illiterate, ill-timed, anti-senior health-care plan. Who could resist? The Democrats and the mainstream media have become obsessed with making the deal and figuring out how to eliminate opposition. But the public is still back on the substance. And like Paglia, it is likely to conclude that this is the worst of all possible worlds. Never has the status quo looked so good.

RTR.

Re feminism, Pelosi's "ruthlessness" has set "a new standard" for women in politics:

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi scored a giant gain for feminism last weekend. In shoving her controversy-plagued healthcare reform bill to victory by a paper-thin margin, she conclusively demonstrated that a woman can be just as gritty, ruthless and arm-twisting in pursuing her agenda as anyone in the long line of fabled male speakers before her. Even a basic feminist shibboleth like abortion rights became just another card for Pelosi to deal and swap. . . . Pelosi's hard-won, trench-warfare win sets a new standard for U.S. women politicians and is certainly well beyond anything the posturing but ineffectual Hillary Clinton has ever achieved.

Ah, progress. Feminism has made the world safe for the power-drunk likes of Madame Speaker.

Bonus from Camille on atheism:

On other matters, I was recently flicking my car radio dial and heard an affected British voice tinkling out on NPR. I assumed it was some fussy, gossipy opera expert fresh from London. To my astonishment, it was Richard Dawkins, the thrice-married emperor of contemporary atheists. I had never heard him speak, so it was a revelation. On science, Dawkins was spot on -- lively and nimble. But on religion, his voice went "Psycho" weird (yes, Alfred Hitchcock) -- as if he was channeling some old woman with whom he was in love-hate combat. I have no idea what ancient private dramas bubble beneath the surface there. As an atheist who respects and studies religion, I believe it is fair to ask what drives obsessive denigrators of religion. Neither extreme rationalism nor elite cynicism are adequate substitutes for faith, which fulfills a basic human need -- which is why religion will continue to thrive in our war-torn world.

Linked at Michelle Malkin (buzzworthy)

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