Healthcare reform furor steeped in Americanism

Dear Editor:

We’re un-American?

It is an absolute disgrace that the two democratically-elected leaders of the House of Representatives, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, called their fellow Americans ‘UN-American’ in their effort to stall, question or delay until further review the installation of the framework of a government takeover of the U.S. healthcare system.

Their Op-Ed piece appeared in USA Today on Aug. 10.

Aren’t these two politicians the same people who claimed that opposition to the policies of former President George W Bush was patriotic? Why is it now not vogue to go against the establishment in questioning the 1,200-page healthcare reform (read “takeover”) bill being debated back and forth in the halls of Congress, coffee shops, town halls and dinner tables across America? Why do they think they can shove a bill of such magnitude down the throats of the American people?

Perhaps they have forgotten the famous first words enshrined by the Founding Fathers in the First Amendment of the Constitution: “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech.”

Of course, Pelosi and Hoyer calling healthcare reform debaters ‘un-American’ doesn’t constitute the U.S. Congress crafting legislation inflicting a restriction on the debate of their healthcare bill. However, it does inflict a tremendous amount of public pressure and intimidation on those who would even dare question the merits of government-run healthcare and its management.

Couple this ‘un-American’ charge with the White House’s outright witch hunt for “fishy” comments made by everyday Americans and what you end up with is a nation of people whose desire to question their government is stifled for fear of “Big Brother.”

There is nothing more American than an elected official facing his constituents at a local town hall debating a law being crafted in Washington, D.C. We should be relishing these sights and shouting right back, “Yes, we can” stop this overthrow of American ideals.

I can only imagine the delight on the faces of the Founding Fathers as they realize that real hope and change does exist in the republic they founded and that there still remains a deep desire in the hearts and minds of the American people to choose their own destiny, especially when it comes to the medical treatments they receive and the right to choose when they and not some “death panel” leave this Earth to go to their everlasting resting place.

Wake up America… before it’s too late!

Buddy Boe,

LaPlace, La.