‘This Is What Change Looks Like’

“This is what change looks like.” These are the words our pathetic adolescent excuse for a president uttered, in his smug, self-congratulatory way, after the House of Representatives passed the health care reform bill, on Sunday. Hit that campaign slogan, oh brilliant one. You must be so proud.

Change looks like ignoring the obvious will of the people. Change looks like buying off senators to get them to vote for a bill that’s supposed to be so wonderful that they should have no reason to vote against it. Change looks like bullying and bribing, with implied threats and backroom deals, organizations that have every reason to be natural enemies of such a bill. Change looks like twisting the process to give political cover to those who really don’t want to vote for something that they can see is not popular with their constituents. Change looks like having to pull out all of the stops to force something through a congress dominated by your own party. Change looks like making claims in speeches that are demonstrably false, simply by reading the legislation. Change looks like double-dealing — signing a bill that says one thing (because it’s what some members of congress want), but promising to do something else (because that’s what some other members want). Change looks like forcing businesses to sell what you want them to sell, how you want them to sell it, taking options away from both the businesses and their customers. Change looks like forcing citizens into participating in a certain activity — forcing them to buy something from someone else — simply because they are alive — because YOU say they must.

So, that’s what change looks like? I guess some kind of “change” may look like that. Maybe, before the next time the uncritical masses cast a vote for something as vague as “change,” they’ll stop to ask… “What kind?”