Hijacking the Health Debate for Hate Mongering
Put forth on September 17, 2009 by XicanoPwr
Posted in Democrats, Health Care, Human Rights, Immigration, Republican
What should have been a discussion on health care reform quickly turned into a debate on immigration after the President’s address to congress. In one quick move a little-known Republican Congressman from South Carolina hijacked the issue of health care by shouting two little words, “You lie!”
As President Obama addressed a joint session of Congress on health care reform, Rep Joe Wilson shouted “You lie!” in response to Obama’s statement that none of the current proposals would “insure illegal immigrants.”
Republican leaders were quick to distance themselves from Wilson’s outburst and demanded that he apologize to Obama immediately. Wilson did, yet, insisting his outburst was “spontaneous,” and that he “let [his] emotions get the best of” him. In a statement, Wilson said:
“This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the president’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill. While I disagree with the President’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.”
Rep Joe Wilson calling President Barack Obama a “liar” during the president’s health care speech last week is not a surprise. It only proved what many pro-migrant and civil rights organizations have been saying – the politics surrounding health care reform remain inseparably tied to the racial politics embroiled in the movement for immigration reform. After all, Wilson’s extreme anti-immigrant positions are well known.
Even though most reporters and fact checkers found that it was Wilson who was wrong, however, there are still some Republican officials who insist it is the other way around. They are willing to acknowledge the undocumented immigrants do not qualify for federal health programs, the problem is not what’s in the bill, it’s what the bill leaves out – a provision to enforce the no “illegals” rule.
Wilson accomplished what he was set out to do – to divert attention from the real issue by inserting a wedge issue – immigration – to stir up its myopic, intransigent conservative base and reorient the media.
GOP – The Party of Fear and Loathing
Republicans insist that fear is not part of their strategy in trying to defeat the current health overhaul effort. However, some say otherwise. Richard Blair from All Spine Zone suggests it was “planned and scripted and sanctioned by the GOP leadership well in advance of Obama’s speech.”
Wilson’s comment is just the tip of the iceberg. Instead of a serious and sustained national debate, the Republican Party’s political strategy resort to using wedge issues to get the citizenry riled up, using one part fear, and one part good old fashioned American bigotry.
In July, Think Progress reported, Robert MacGuffie of rightprinciples.com disseminated a strategy memo outlining best-practices for protesters who plan to enter and disrupt the health care town hall events. According to the memo, “[best-practices] could be useful to activists in just about any district where their Congressperson has supported the socialist agenda of the Democrat leadership in Washington.”
Reported earlier in the year, GOP spin guru, Frank Luntz, authored a messaging memo defining the Republican rhetoric on health care reform. The memo “The Language of Health Care 2009″ lays out the argument for “stopping the ‘Washington takeover’ of health care.”
However, the damage was already done. Wilson’s “You lie!” has hijacked and obscured the real debate over health care reform and turn it into an immigration debate. The health care debate is anything but a debate – filled with endless mudslinging, demagoguery, innuendos, half-truths, and blind partisanship. The Democratic Party bought into it hook, line and sinker.
Xenophobic Democrats Come Home to Roost
Last November’s election gave Democrats not only control of both the House and Senate, but also the White House. Many in the immigrant rights movement have looked to the new Democratic Congress and President Obama to provide an alternative to Bush and the hardliners. However, the right still directs the debate. Obama and congressional Democrats have already conceded vast political terrain when it comes to immigration.
If the GOP is the party of fear mongering, then the Democratic Party is the party of appeasement. To figure out how this came about, sometimes it is necessary to dig into the past in order to illuminate the present.
This political strategy took, shape after George Bush beat Michael Dukakis in the 1988 presidential election largely by accusing him of being soft on crime. After the election, the Democratic leaders felt party’s survival depended on accepting the logic of the right on issues the Democrats were perceived weak. Since then, there has been a converging of both parties on law and order: each agreeing more needs to be done on crime. In this context, elections have often degenerated into rhetorical bidding wars, with each side vying to out bid the other with tough and tougher responses to crime.
Once again, Democrat leaders are adopting a “lesser evil” strategy by incorporating large segments of the Republican immigration reform strategy as their own. The Obama administration’s “security measures” have been lifted directly from the previous administration’s measures designed to push undocumented workers out of the workplace and isolate them even more into segregated communities.
The Democratic leadership’s preference for bipartisan commitment over human needs is a reflection of the balance of power within the party. With the rise of the Blue Dogs, they now can claim de facto veto power over new legislation.
To prove the Democratic Party is not “soft on immigration,” Senate Democrats added additional requirements to the Senate bill to make it “tougher” on immigrants to get health care. Furthermore, President Barack Obama said he would not allow “illegal immigrants” to buy insurance through the purchasing exchanges, including from participating private companies.
Immigration has been a very useful political football for the past three decades and what is taking place is no different. As a consequence, undocumented immigrants are once again wielded as a weapon. The saying that those who forget the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them has a lot of truth in it.
It seems that we have learned nothing since the same issue was first argued after the passage of welfare reform in 1996, which increasingly limited, access to publicly funded health programs. In during those 10 + years, it has resulted in less preventive health care, including prenatal care, and poorer health outcomes, including those associated with childbirth. The worse part, it affects those who are born here. So how can one member of the family be covered and yet deny their parents?
Interestingly, President Obama said:
Now, even if we provide these affordable options, there may be those — particularly the young and healthy — who still want to take the risk and go without coverage. There may still be companies that refuse to do right by their workers. The problem is, such irresponsible behavior costs all the rest of us money. If there are affordable options and people still don’t sign up for health insurance, it means we pay for those people’s expensive emergency room visits.
Does anybody see the contradiction in this?
The same argument could be said about not covering the undocumented? Without coverage, we will continue to pay for those “expensive emergency room visits.” The ONLY way to guarantee that the undocumented are not “abusing” our tax dollars is by extending the 287g program or assign an ICE agent to every health care facility in the US, thus creating stronger restrictions on who qualifies for privileges and rights who will be omitted by the nature of their skin color, language, or national origin. In other words, they will have to ask almost every foreign looking person are they legal or not. Now honestly, how logical is that really?
If we are supposed take responsibility as US citizens for our health – especially for the US born children of undocumented citizens – then only way we are able to enhance the nation’s public health is by assuring that all who reside in the United States, including undocumented immigrants, have access to quality health care.
Second, not to do so, only reflects this country’s disregard to the immigrant workforce and their contribution to this economy. Undocumented immigrants live and work in this country. They contribute to the society through the wealth they create for their employers and through the taxes that they pay. Yes, their taxes, for even if they are working “off the books” for cash, they still pay sales and property taxes which support most local services.
This political game of who can come up with a tougher “enforcement only” policy between Democrats and Republicans must stop. The only ones who are really being affected by this senseless argument are the people because, as long we continue this argument, all we are really doing is creating tiers of human beings. Who has this right? Who has that right? It becomes that the undocumented have X amount of rights, legal permanent residents have X amount of rights and US citizens have X amount of rights. And now that we have created these tiers of citizenship, those categories are what is being internalized and this is the reason why people can compartmentalize the undocumented as being different. The are different, because they have different rights and a totally different experience.
Support for the “lesser evil” strategy to shape the Democratic Party not only undermines the fight against the right, but it allows the anti-immigrant push to continue at the local and state level. It provides fuel for hate-radio demagogues, anti-Latino crusaders like Arizona’s notorious Sheriff Joe Arpaio, and violent anti-immigrant organizations like the Minutemen. It helps to diffuse and dampen the struggle for reforms, by bringing activists in tow behind the party.
As activists who hoped an Obama presidency would bring real change on the issue of immigrant rights, this is our wake up call. The anti-immigrant climate is shifting, and will shift further, if we continue to blindly support Democratic candidates who claim they are in favor of immigration reform. Comprehensive immigration reform will come through demonstrations, strikes, boycotts and sit-ins and calling out politicians of both parties.
Health care is a human rights issue, not based on profit margins. We must demand a health care system that will cover everybody.
We must demand humane comprehensive immigration reform that includes legalization for the undocumented and adjustments in visa programs to reflect the reality of continued immigration of workers. We must demand a moratorium on enforcement actions by Homeland Security, except those that target violent criminals, drug dealers and real terrorists who threaten our people’s security.
Most importantly, we must reward the thousands of law-abiding students who were brought to the United States years ago as undocumented immigrant children, and who have since grown up here, stayed in school, through the passage of the DREAM Act.
Related posts
Tags: Barack Obama, Democrats, Health Care, Immigration, republican party, Xenophobia | 
Print This Post
|
This is the blog of Edmundo "XicanoPwr" Rocha, a social worker, an activist, freelance writer and founder and editor of The Sanctuary. My interests include: immigration reform, critical race theory and it's interaction with equality/inequality and freedom/oppression as they relate to the experiences of people of color in the Americas.
Para Justicia y Libertad is a Latino-centered political blog focusing on the humanistic perspective of politics, history, and society as they relate to the Latina/o community throughout Texas and the United States.
11 Responses to “Hijacking the Health Debate for Hate Mongering”
2 Trackbacks/Pingbacks
9 Comments
You can follow any responses to this entry through the
Comments (RSS) feed.
Its time to re-examine instant citizenship (Anchor babies) which hasn’t been illuminated enough, to growing concern of the American public. For decades now pregnant women have arrived on tourist’s visas, through the fence and even at ports of call. Very aware of our mis-interpreted law governing “birthright citizenship”, that attributes full rights to the Mother of an illegal immigrant. How can Americans benefit from this Health care reform package, when we must subsidize millions of households and not just the original interloper? Outlined in the spring issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons is an article that will stun a prudent person. An illegal alien entered the states in 1997 to work as a fruit picker, bringing with him his wife and three children; all illegal aliens.
The lady gave birth to a fourth child, and with that birth the family had an “anchor baby”—an American citizen by birth, who provided the entire family with a free pass to remain in the United States permanently and collect government, subsides. Unfortunately the baby was born prematurely, spent three months in the neonatal incubator, and cost the San Joaquin Hospital more than $300,000. Meanwhile, the oldest daughter married an illegal alien and gave birth to her own anchor baby, and then the wife gave birth to yet another baby. ALL PAID FOR BY—YOU!
This is just one taxpayer example of the ‘Rule of law’ that has cost taxpayers billions of dollars. A nurse admitted last weekend, according to Review-Journal reported that cash-strapped UMC hospital in Nevada is providing more than $20 million a year in emergency dialysis care for uninsured, illegal immigrants. Is American society insane when poverty stricken Americans are turned away, go bankrupt and sometimes die? TAXPAYERS ARE TAXED FOR THIS, BUT NOT FOR OUR OWN PEOPLE? We must insist that a Birthright Citizenship lawsuit be filed with the federal court and its original intent revisited? That E-Verify should be fully funded and a highly skilled MIT team, building on the original Immigration enforcement database to a highest level of security that cannot be compromised by the use of fraudulent documents.
The PC oriented application must be installed permanently on every business computer across this country? ICE should have the manpower to audit every workplace, with the power to arrest and detain employers who snub immigration laws? Repeat offenders should be dealt with harshly, including prison and confiscation of business assets. There should be no mitigating excuses because illegal immigrants are—STEALING JOBS– on any rung of the employment ladder? These employers for years have been an intended magnet for destitute labor in many cases, but have left the burden of paying for schooling for the children, health care and a veiled miscellaneous core of government handouts to US taxpayers. THIS IS NOT ABOUT RACISM, BUT AN ULTIMATE FINANCIAL MATTER OF SURVIVAL FOR US ALL! Coincidentally, I want a government health care, specially for some low income American family members.
Insist your politicians guarantee E-Verify is fully funded and is not scuttled by Sen. Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Janet Napolitano or any other high ranking Democrats. The Washington switchboard has their number at 202-224-3121. Research these laws, true facts and incredulous stats at NUMBERSUSA & JUDICIAL WATCH
Amen. We need to step up the efforts and hold BOTH GOP and Dems accountable…
Brittanicus, old dear, speaking of the “myopic conservative base,” I do wish you’d clean your specs and read the article before posting more of your boilerplate blather. I don’t mind reasonable disagreement. You’re entitled to your opinions, and even to your curious usage of English (”true facts and incredulous stats” was my chuckle for the morning. Do you own a dictionary? Toddle over and use it before you post any polysyllabic words. It would save you looking silly.) Leaving the caps lock on is rude. And posting acres of stuff that doesn’t have to do with the article is just boring.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution is not just a nuisance. It’s part of the law that did away with slavery and (not enough of!) its aftereffects. It states that any child born in the U.S. to parents present and under jurisdiction of the U.S. is a citizen. That means the mother doesn’t have diplomatic immunity. If the child’s mother is subject to arrest, ironically, the kid’s a citizen.
If you worry that this will lead to instant naturalization of large numbers of the undocmented, then you don’t know very much about the naturalization process. Under present law, it would be a matter of around 25 to 30 years after the child’s birth before the mother could become a legal permanent resident, and 5 years more before she could apply for citizenship. Me, I’ve got more urgent things to worry about.
Now, as to the actual subject of the blog, which you never mentioned: It’s lamentable that Obama caved in to the forces of reaction and said that undocumented people wouldn’t be covered by his proposed plan. This is lousy public health policy, inter alia. The health debate is important. Wilson was rude. The derailing of the discussion is unfortunate. “Xicano” is right.
Now go crawl back under your rock.
Excellent piece! Ignore Brittanicus, he is a no-talent-ass-clown-troll who spends his days cutting and pasting the same bs on every website related to immigration.
thank you for calling Democrats out as the party of “appeasement.” As Jimmy Carter spoke the truth the other day about the underlying racism of Wilson’s comment, the Huffington Post focused solely on the issue of black/white, Congress vs. President. But the real elephant in the room is “racism” (xenophobia) against immigrants. If the so-called liberals gloss over this crucial point and back down, they are doing a greater disservice to reform and real change in the U.S. than Republicans are.
Unfortunately, those who advocate full benefit of citizenship who disrespect our country by entering illegally have the backing of open border advocates who never let vile slogans get in the way of truth. Legally obtained citizenship either is the rule of law ,or we should just surrender this country altogether.
The social and economic needs of other countries can’t be allowed to become yet another entitlement program in the U.S. We’re broke and we’re tired, too.
It’s time to confront the Mexican government on fixing its social problems. The widespread corruption and whitening culture are tanking this country to the verge of collapse. The whitest citizens are on the top and the rest are being ignored. In Mexico the darker your skin the more likelihood you will live in poverty for the rest of your life. The Afro-Mexicans are vilified as the demons of the society.
Great post, XP. It’s time to stand up to the Joe Wilson’s and pass sane immigration reform.
Also, it is absolutely ludicrous to deny immigrants from BUYING health care with their own money. This is outrageous.
And it raises the stakes for passing immigration reform– big time.
TGood & The Vigilanty: care to make some sense? Maybe you could address points brought up in the article instead of going off on tangents with no basis in fact.
Obama’s decision to cave to conservatives on the issue of healthcare for immigrants just shows that this is on the way to becoming a human rights issue.
Brittanicus = racist
I don’t know if you noticed, Brittanicus, but this isn’t VDare and it isn’t Stormfront, though both those sites would be happy to have you.
And it is discouraging how weasely most Democrats are on immigration. They don’t understand that no one respects a weasel–the weasel policy actually hurts them with voters. If they stood up for the rights of immigrants and their citizen family members, they would do much better in the polls and have a more positive impact in the debate. As it is, they accomplish nothing and no one respects them.
Speak your mind
Comment Policy: First time comments are moderated. Please be patient.