Far be it from me to give Republicans political advice but this clamor to “Repeal It!” while Barack Obama is still in office and would have to sign any bill repealing the freshly signed health insurance reform seems a little … uhhh … dumb?

But hey, guys, knock yourselves out, right?

And that’s just what the GOPosaurs in my district of MI-01 are doing. Both super-conservative Tim Walberg and super-duper conservative Brian Rooney have both signed the “Repeal It!” pledge sponsored by the Club for Growth.

But yesterday, this political grandstanding met the bitter, harsh reality of our nation’s health insurance crisis, a crisis the new law hopes to alleviate in part, on the pages of the Jackson Citizen Patriot‘s website. On the page reporting Walberg’s and Rooney’s signing of the silly, toothless pledge is a link to a related story. The story is of a 19-year old young man, one of nine kids in his family, who has cancer. His family has no health insurance.



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Here’s a blurb from the first article:

Two Republican candidates who want to unseat U.S. Rep. Mark Schauer have pledged to work to repeal the health care reform bill President Obama signed today. The conservative group Club for Growth has created a Web site…where lawmakers, candidates and citizens can join the campaign to get rid of the law they find too expensive and intrusive…As of this morning, more than 50 lawmakers and close to 200 candidates have signed the pledge, as well as more than 13,000 citizens. The candidate pledge reads: “I hereby pledge to the people of my district/state upon my election to the U.S. House of Representatives/U.S. Senate, to sponsor and support legislation to repeal any federal health care takeover passed in 2010, and replace it with real reforms that lower health care costs without growing government.”

And here’s a bit from the story of the pancake breakfast held to benefit the 19-year old man from Michigan Center:

Both his mother and stepfather are facing financial difficulties and do not have insurance. [Jake Fagan] first began experiencing pain in the fall of 2009 but did not notify his parents until months later. By the time doctors examined the him, they discovered a large tumor had already spread into Fagan’s abdomen. Had he notified his parents earlier, the cancer might not have advanced so quickly. […] Moose Davis said his stepson has not let the cancer dampen his spirits. “He didn’t want to be treated any differently,” Davis said. “I still joke around and give him a hard time sometimes.” Fagan is more than happy to have the jokes directed toward him. “It helps me keep my mind off (the disease),” he said. As of Saturday’s event, more than $4,000 had been raised. “I was hoping and praying we’d get to two grand,” Hitt said. “I’m just ecstatic that we hit this.”

It’s going to take a lot of pancake breakfasts for Jake and his family to pay for his medical care. Under the current system, he’ll never get health insurance now, not with cancer.

So when Rooney and Walberg and all the other Republicans happily sign a pledge to “Repeal It!”, that’s what they are signing on to:

Restoring the ability of health insurers to reject customers with preexisting conditions

Taking away the high-risk pool that would help families like Jake’s in the future

Taking away Jake’s ability to stay on his parent’s insurance (if they manage to get some) until he is 26

Restoring health insurance companies’ ability to cut people off when they get sick or when they have reached some payment ceiling.

The list goes on and on. So go ahead and stake your claim to that bit of hateful land, Tim and Brian. When Representative Mark Schauer is running his campaign to retain his seat as the Democratic Congressman from MI-07, he’ll be able to proudly point to his vote to start the process of fixing the system that makes families hold pancake breakfasts and bake sales just so that they can receive health care.

Let me know how that works out for you.

UPDATE: Oh, look. The Senate Conservatives Fund PAC has their own Repeal It! pledge site now. Go get ’em, conservatives!

I’m just sayin’…

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