Rick Esenberg, July 10, 2008:
My second post ("Being serious ...) was prompted by commenters who repeated the slander that "Bush lied and people died." If you believe that, I do think that you are either misinformed or hopelessly partisan; even not serious.
Rick Esenberg, August 5, 2009:
He is, of course, correct in that the bill does not call for "mandatory" end of life planning. It only provides that such planning will be paid for - presumably in ways that it is not today. (Having dealt with the death of two elderly parents - my Mom and Karen's Dad - there certainly was a lot of discussion of those matters.)
Of course you get what you pay for and that may not be all bad. But it is not surprising that there would be a certain sensitivity about the issue given the President's remarks about limiting care for those with limited life expectancy and the experience with that type of thing in other "universal care" schemes.
Rick made the first statement after it was clear beyond doubt that the Bush Administration cherrypicked intelligence in making its case for the war and ignored and buried intelligence that undercut their assertions that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction and planning to palm them off to al-Qaeda. As Fred Kaplan said:
It is worth noting that the claims that reflected U.S. intelligence—on biological weapons, ballistic missiles, and support for non-al-Qaida terrorist groups—were, while serious, not the sorts of threats that would rally a nation to war. Meanwhile, the claims that did galvanize support for the invasion—on nuclear weapons and alliances with al-Qaida—either exaggerated or falsified the intelligence of the day.
Or, as Dick Cheney said on August 6, 2002:
"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction."
Simply stated that was a big fat lie. Cheney had no grounds for making such a statement of metaphysical certitude -- and he certainly knew that. He was trying to sow a false impression of the threat Iraq posed. He was, in short, lying. Seriously.
Meanwhile. Esenberg's response to rightwing claims that HB 3200 empowers big gummint to guide "you in death" and "have a say in how your life ends" is that it is "not surprising."
Esenberg sincerely believes he is a serious person who uses his blog to "explore issues." Why?
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