The Crowbar

ThinkProgress blogger Lee Fang rallies the leftist co-dependents by portraying Eric Cantor as a Villainous Republican who won’t help Patricia Churchill’s needy relative who has stomach cancer. During a town hall meeting Cantor attended on 9/21/2009:

Patricia Churchill relayed a story about a close family member who recently lost a high paying job and her health insurance. Churchill told Cantor that her relative was dying of stomach tumors and needs an operation as soon as possible. Cantor responded by suggesting that Churchill’s relative should seek “existing government programs” or find charity.

CHURCHILL: I have a very close relative, a woman in her early forties, who did have a wonderful, high-paying job, owns her own home and is a real contributing member of society. She lost her job. Just a couple of weeks ago, she found out that she has tumors in her belly and that she needs an operation. Her doctors told her that they are growing and that she needs to get this operation quickly. She has no insurance. [...]

Assuming Churchill is telling the truth, it is truly awful is it to lose your job and soon thereafter be diagnosed with cancer!

Interesting that the relative has “no insurance” and yet she’s seeing still seeing a doctor and has had medical tests showing she has cancer?? But, I digress.

Cantor’s response to Churchill is to note that, without knowing the details he can only recommend Medicare or charity, but pay attention to the last sentence:

CANTOR: First of all I guess I would ask what the situation is in terms of income eligibility and the existing programs that are out there. Because if we look at the uninsured that are out there right now, there is probably 23, 24% of the uninsured that is already eligible for an existing government program [...] Beyond that, I know that there are programs, there are charitable organizations, there are hospitals here who do provide charity care if there’s an instance of indigency and the individual is not eligible for existing programs that there can be some cooperative effort. No one in this country, given who we are, should be sitting without an option to be addressed.

Uh, boy. Unfortunately, Cantor’s statement leaves the door wide open to the Government-Takes-Care-Of-Me  madness of the left. Fang takes full advantage of Cantor’s foolhardy concession:

In an interview with ThinkProgress after the event, Churchill explained that her relative, who needs help now, probably won’t qualify for a low-income government program like Medicaid and that there are very long waiting periods for charity programs. Asked about Cantor’s response to her question, Churchill said, “it was helpful in a sense, but of course nowhere near as helpful as having this healthcare reform bill passed so that we could know that she could definitely go and get taken care of.”

Because, you see, Chirchill’s relative NEEDS the government to take of her. She can’t take care of herself, and nobody else will take care of her, so it’s the Government’s job to take care of her and the taxpayers NEED to pay for her cancer treatment.

But, it really isn’t the Government’s job. It’s Chirchill’s relative’s job to take care of herself, to take responsibility for her own life and accept the consequences of her decisions. That’s what an adult does, but Churchill and Fang see the mystery relative as a needy child, and that’s likely how she sees herself. They rob her of her self-respect.

That’s what political co-dependents do. They draw you in with promises of “help” when you need it the most, but the price is your self-respect – and ultimately your freedom.