Democrats on health care reform feel as betrayed as Tiger Woods' women

Photo: AP/David J. Phillip, File

"I wouldn't stay with him!"  That is what Hugh Hefner's girlfriend Crystal Harris says about Tiger Woods and Tiger's wife Elin Nordegren .  "He has a way to make you believe that he's a very honest and good man.... I don't think he's an honest man."  That is what Cori Rist, one of Tiger Woods' alleged mistresses, said about Tiger. These women might as well have been Democrats talking about Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, President Barack Obama, and the big capitulation of 2009 that is called "health care reform."

Photo: AP/Haraz N. Ghanbari

In the past several days, Reid and his fellow Democrats, who have a substantial majority in the U.S. Senate, have reportedly scrapped the cornerstones of "health care reform." First to go was the "public option," which was a necessary mechanism to provide a check against steep price increases and other monopolistic practices by the health insurance industry.  The public option was already a skeleton of its former self, having been doomed last September when President Obama, in his major speech about health insurance reform before a joint session of Congress, mentioned only a "new insurance exchange" that would only be available for people with no insurance.   Then, in the past few days, the Senate has reportedly scrapped the idea of expanding Medicare to cover people 55 years of age and older.  What's left is more like a goodie bag for the insurance companies, including no check on their prices, and the biggest Christmas present of all, a mandate that everyone in America buy health insurance, which will give the insurance companies tens of millions of new customers.

Democrats feel stung because they remember the promises their leaders made to them.  They remember Harry Reid saying to them after their hard work helped the Democrats take back the Senate in 2006, "it's time for a change."  They remember working so hard to elect candidate Barack Obama, who promised, "[e]veryone will be able to buy into a new health insurance plan that's similar to the one that every federal employee...currently has for themselves."

So, Tiger Woods' women, you have been jilted and betrayed?  Democrats know exactly how you feel.

For more on the broken promises of health insurance reform, check out these links:

• House passes health insurance reform as Republicans just say "no"
• Republican Senator instructs his Republican colleagues to shut down the U.S. Senate
• Teabaggers plan to stage "die-in" on Capitol Hill
  

© 2009 Matthew Emmer -- All Rights Reserved

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