[Le Temps, Switzerland]
El Tiempo, Colombia
Joe Wilson and the Self-Destructive 'American Taliban'
"Among the many undocumented
immigrants who have no access to medical care are the people who cook the food,
wait on restaurant tables and enter the homes of the working class to take care of their children every
day."
EDITORIAL
Translated By Liz Essary
September 16, 2009
Colombia
- El Tiempo - Original Article (Spanish)
Emboldened by the rare
insolence of a South Carolina congressional representative who interrupted the president’s
speech last week, the Taliban wing of the Republican Party has specifically
attacked the undocumented.
The entire world must know
by now that Obama's health care reform, as the president has explained,
wouldn’t benefit those in the country illegally; and that by yelling to Obama during his speech
that he was lying, Republican
representative Joe Wilson broke protocol and Congressional rules that demand
decorum and respect for the office of president.
What's not so widely known is that Wilson is a member
of a group called the Sons of
Confederate Veterans based in South Carolina, the slave state that
started the Civil War by becoming the first to secede from the American Union
in 1860. He built his political career as a protégé of Strom Thurmond, a senator
from the same state who died in 2003 convinced that the country should have
remained racially segregated; and that in 2000, Wilson spearheaded the fight to
keep the Confederate flag flying over the state capitol.
The plain and simple truth is
that Wilson is the one who's lying. The bills being debated in the House of
Representatives say explicitly that neither the subsidies nor the funds used to
expand coverage may be spent on illegal immigrants.
And even if in their poverty, some undocumented immigrants continue to
receive some kind of medical care through Medicaid, the system created to serve
the very poorest, according the independent organizations like the Tax Foundation, the
number of applicants would be so small that it would never have the economic
impact that Wilson and his Taliban assure us they would.
As it is currently drafted,
undocumented immigrants wouldn’t qualify for the purchase of health insurance nor
would they receive subsidies; nor would they be obliged to purchase insurance.
And it is this issue,
although it is celebrated by these Taliban, which should be of greatest concern.
Because among the many who have no access to medical services are the very
people who cook the food, wait on restaurant tables and enter the homes of the
working class to take care of their children every day.
Posted by WORLDMEETS.US
Situated in the extreme east
of the nation, it's likely that Wilson of South Carolina isn't aware of the
political debacle the California branch of his party brought about for itself due to the anti-immigrant
attitude of another Wilson. Seeking to ensure his reelection in 1994, Pete
Wilson blamed undocumented immigrants for all that was bad in the state. With
his lies, he won a Pyrrhic
victory, not only winning the antipathy of Latino voters, but condemning his
party to political irrelevance. And don’t be fooled: years later, Arnold
Schwarzenegger won the governorship not because he was Republican, but because
he was an actor in Hollywood blockbusters.
America's domestic debate goes global: The
caption
says 'SECRET WEAPON.' In the holster of the
Obama
-hating U.S. southerner is Geert Wilders, a
controversial
right-wing Dutch politician who leads the
anti-immigrant
Party for Freedom. The message: Geert Wilders
would
do well in the American south.
Unfortunately for democracy,
California Republicans today are such a weak minority that they only serve to
clog progress. That is why it's up to the party's enlightened few to recover its
place as the loyal opposition. Now is the time for voices of sanity to appear
and put an end to extremism.
Let’s not forget that it was
John McCain himself who worked for years to end the demonization of the undocumented,
and showed that a rational conservative could work with a liberal like Ted
Kennedy to propose reform of the immigration system that included legalizing
those who Joe Wilson so delights in bashing.
To extricate the country from
the serious problem it finds itself, both parties must concur, and such a collaboration
should begin by agreeing to terms for reforming the health system and carry on
by reforming that of national immigration.
SEE ALSO ON THIS:
El Pais, Spain:
The 'Weight' of Obama's 'Word'
Financial Times Deutschland, Germany:
Obama’s Health Care 'Coup'
Der Tagesspiegel, Germany:
Americans Demand 'Freedom' to Pay More for Less
Le Figaro, France:
Health Care: Obama's 'Moment of Truth'
Le Quotidien d'Oran, Algeria:
Health Care Knocks Obama Off of His Cloud
The Independent, U.K.:
The Brutal Truth About American Health Care
Daily Mail, U.K.:
U.S. Debate on Health
Care 'Fit Only for Children's Ward'
CLICK HERE FOR SPANISH
VERSION
[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US September 24, 11:59pm]
