The truth is one of the first casualties of Obama Derangement Syndrome

Mark Twain once said "a lie will travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes."  In the world of the conservative blogosphere, now the lie makes it way all the way around the world and back again in that same period of time.

The latest example of this is the rumor that the number for information on the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) is 1800FUCKYOU.  Hold on to your seats Obama haters, it aint true.

Buzz and I were having breakfast this morning while discussing the hot draft prospects in the WNBA, when we overheard a few customers talking to a waitress.  They told her that the number for Obamacare information is 1800FUCKYOU.  The waitress was a bit incredulous, but decided to give it a try. 

She called the number, and lo and behold, she got a message that said "press one for Obamacare."  It was enough to convince her, but like most of the crap fed to us by the right wing and suffers of Obama Derangement Syndrome (ODS,)  it just isn't true.

Buzz looked up from his WNBA fantasy cheat sheet and said.  "Excuse me, what did they use the phrase Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act?'

"Obamacare," was her reply.

Buzz went on to explain that the federal government does not refer to the Affordable Care Act as Obamacare.  It refers to the Act by its real name --- The Affordable Care Act.  Obamacare is the shorthand name given to it by the media, the right wing, or who really knows who first termed the phrase. 

One of the customers thought for a minute, and said, "that handsome gentleman in the tweed jacket and turtle neck is right."  Since I was wearing a Nehru jacket, I realized she was referring to Buzz and his Obamacare comment and not my overall choice for first pick in the WNBA draft.

When we got back to the VW Microbus, Buzz powered up the Univac 3000 to do a little research.

He found a snopes.com article. Those who may be unfamiliar with snopes.com should know that snopes.com is a website dedicated to debunking or proving urban legends, myths, rumors, misinformation, and folklore

Here's what they found:

Although 800-318-2596 is the correct phone number for the Health Insurance Marketplace customer service line, and turning its digits into letters as they are found on telephone keypads does produce the phrase 800-FUCKYO (among many other possibilities.)  Of course, it only works by ignoring the "1," because standard keypads have no letters on the "1."

Technically, the 800-318-2596 phone number cannot correctly be rendered as 800-FUCKYO because that designation omits the essential '1' digit between the '3' and '8' and therefore does not represent an accurate phone number for the Health Insurance Marketplace hotline (or a valid phone number at all). A correct rendering of the phone number would be the somewhat less salacious 1-800-F1UCKYO.

Additionally, the 800-318-2596 phone number wasn't selected by the current administration, as it has been used as a toll-free government number for providing information about Medicare plans since at least as far back as 1999.

The current assignee of the 1-800-FUCKYOU number (a phone sex line) has now updated their initial recording greeting with a message asking callers to indicate whether or not they are calling about Obamacare.

Sorry we had to debunk this myth for our friends who suffer from ODS and all those innocent people who were duped by another ODS pipedream.

But, alas, there is still hope for ODS suffers, according to Buzz's research on the Univac 3000, the Obamacare death panels have decreed that ODS is a covered affliction under Obamacare, even if it is a pre-existing condition before you sign up for insurance.  There is one catch, however, treatment is long term "in-patient" at the FEMA internment camps.
 

PA Governor Tom "Frank Drebin" Corbett strikes again with brother/sister marriage comment

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett has done it again.  He has shown us why Buzz and I believe that he may be , in reality, Detective Frank Drebin from Police Squad.

There has always been the physical resemblance, but his latest comments show a keen mental resemblance, too.

Corbett was on WHP-TV in Harrisburg when an anchor asked about a statement his lawyers made in a recent court filing, comparing the marriage of gay couples to the marriage of children because neither can legally wed in the state.

"It was an inappropriate analogy, you know," Corbett said. "I think a much better analogy would have been brother and sister, don't you?"

Pennsylvania is the only Northeastern state that does not recognize same sex marriage, and as long as Governor Frank Drebin is in office, the law won't change from the Executive branch of the government.

Fortunately for supports of same sex marriage, a number of law suits are pending in Pennsylvania state and federal courts.  Change will be coming.

Give it a rest GOP!!!!!!!

Guess what Republican Party?  We know you hate Obamacare, but now it's time to use your health insurance to seek a mental health professional.

It has often been said that the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result."  It's true, Buzz looked it up over a thousand times and came up with the same result.  The jury is still out on whether that proves Buzz is sane or insane.

Well, the House Republicans have attempted to repeal all or part of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) about 43 times.  Each time, the bill they passed never made it to the floor of the United States Senate, where even if it did, it was doomed to defeat.  None of this stopped the House GOP.

Now, the GOP controlled House has added a twist --- they will shut down the government in their never ending attempt to derail Obamacare.  Their obsession hasn't just been limited to the House of Representatives.  It has found its way to the United States Senate.

Last week, Texas Senator Ted Cruz rambled on for 21 plus hours, quoting from Dr. Seuss, among other bizarre things, in a pseudo-filibuster.  The Ted Cruz show captured the attention of all the suffers of Obama derangement syndrome (an affliction which causes Republicans to blame Barack Obama for everything that goes bad, regardless of whether Obama was responsible for it or even if the "thing" isn't really bad.)

The facts are simple:  The House and Senate passed Obamacare by majority votes, and it was signed into law by President Barack Obama.  Then after a couple of years of Republicans crying foul and claiming that Obamacare was clearly unconstitutional, the United States Supreme Court ruled, in an opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts, that Obamacare did indeed pass constitutional muster.

In addition to having been approved by all three branches of government, the American people weighed in in 2012, when they handed Obama a clear victory over the anti-Obamacare candidate Mitt Romney.

Give it a rest!  If the law is so terrible, just let it go into full effect and then hammer Obama and the Democrats for its utter failure.  Now that's a great election issue.  The problem is that the failure of Obamacare will only exist in the world of Obama Derangement Syndrome sufferers.  Obamacare, like Medicare and Social Security is here to stay, yeah it may be modified and improved, but it is here to stay.

 

The GOP's real fear brings them back to reality.  They fear, more than anything, that Obamacare will be an unqualified success.  All the fear mongering will prove to be unwarranted. 

The world will not end with the full implementation of Obamacare.  People who have private insurance or Medicare or Medicaid will keep doing what they're doing, but thirty plus million Americans will have health insurance for the first time in their lives. 

Just as it did in the Social Security debate of the 1930s and the Medicare debate of the 1960s, the GOP is on the wrong side of history. 

Message to the GOP, GIVE IT A REST.  Stop trying to get rid of Obamacare, and start proposing laws that will improve the faults of the law.