Texas Governor Rick Perry is shocked–shocked!–that his Tea Party supporters would openly cheer the notion of society’s allowing an uninsured patient to die.
Just that happened during the September 12 GOP Presidential debate in Tampa, Florida.
“What do you tell a guy who is sick, goes into a coma and doesn’t have health insurance? Who pays for his coverage?” CNN Correspondent Wolf Blitzer asked Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas).
When Paul fumbled for an answer, Blitzer persisted: “Are you saying society should just let him die?”
“Yeah!” several members of the right-wing crowd yelled out.
Hoping to counter negative reaction to the sudden unmasking of his supporters’ bloodthirstiness, Perry later claimed: “I was a bit taken aback by that myself. We’re the party of life. We ought to be coming up with ways to save lives.”
He shouldn’t have been surprised. Perry had heard the blood-lust of his supporters just five days earlier, during the September 7 GOP debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California.
“Your state has executed 234 death row inmates, more than any other governor in modern times,” said the debate’s moderater, NBC’s Brian Williams.
Suddenly, the right-wing audience broke into cheers and applause, interrupting Williams’ question.
“Have you struggled to sleep at night with the idea that any one of those might have been innocent?” asked Williams.
“No, sir, I’ve never struggled with that at all,” answered Perry.
“In the state of Texas, “ Perry continued, “if you come into our state and you kill one of our children, you kill a police officer, you’re involved with another crime and you kill one of our citizens, you will face the ultimate justice in the state of Texas, and that is you will be executed.”
The audience again cheered at Perry’s mention of “the ultimate justice.”
So add it up:
- Perry’s Tea Party supporters cheer at the thought of 234 men and women executed by the State.
- Perry utterly rejects the possibility that “any one of those might have been innocent” to more Tea Party cheers.
- Perry’s Tea Party supporters cheer at the thought of letting an uninsured patient die rather than save his life through public-funded coverage.
Is it possible to imagine that Perry’s supporters would cheer:
- For the right of a raped woman to abort the fetus of her rapist?
- For the right of an impoverished defendant to have a publicly-funded attorney?
- For the right of same-sex couples to marry?
Hardly.
The crowds attending the rallies of Joseph McCarthy, Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew knew what they were cheering for.
They relished the slanders of “Communist!” and “traitor!” hurled at every Democratic opponent–including decorated veterans.
Perry’s supporters knew what they cared about when they burst into applause at both GOP debates.
They exulted in the executions of 234 men and women in a state infamous for its failure to protect the most basic rights of its accused citizens.
And they exulted at the prospect of leaving millions of uninsured Americans to die because they couldn’t afford the costly insurance premiums of wealthy patients.
And for all of Perry’s claims that Republicans “are the party of life,” it’s well to look closely at the realities of medicine for ordinary Texans under the 11-year Governorship of Rick Perry.
In fact, the Los Angeles Times recently did just that. Among the findings:
- More than a quarter of Texans lack health insurance, the highest rate in the nation.
- Those costs are passed to the insured. Insurance premiums have risen more quickly in Texas than they have nationally over the last seven years.
- Nearly a third of the state’s children did not receive an annual physical and a teeth cleaning in 2007.
- Over the last decade, infant mortality rates have risen in Texas while declining nationwide.
- One in five seniors, despite guaranteed Medicare coverage, ends up back in the hospital within a month of being released.
- Texas has among the fewest physicians per capita in the country, according to census data.
- This year, the governor and state Legislature slashed funding to train physicians to less than half of what it was a decade ago.
- That came atop $800 million in cuts to hospitals and other medical providers that serve poor children, pregnant women and others who rely on Medicaid.
To understand what the United States would look like under President Rick Perry, it’s only necessary to:
- Discover the true goals championed by Perry and his followers; and
- Contrast his official claims of intent and performance with the realities of life for most Texans.
The result will be both startling and dismaying.
