O Canada New York!

A Democrat from New York, Eric Massa, represents what is considered to be a "predominantly conservative" district in New York. This begs two questions:

1. Conservatives? In NEW YORK?? (No, really. Same question. Just, um, emphasized.)

2. How on earth did he get elected in the first place?

But of course these questions pale in comparison to the flash flood of conservative angst over the fact that this Democratic Congressman dared state that (gasp!) he would vote in favor of a single-payer health care system despite his constituents' wishes.

Big hairy deal.

Like Republicans haven't been doing that over the protests of their own constituents for years now.

No, the sin here isn't in stating a desire to vote contrary to the wishes of the electorate. As far as representation goes, even registered Democrats (including illegal aliens and dead people) are beginning to understand that they didn't necessarily get what they voted for last November. Also, I beg to point out that numerous delegates to both the Second Continental Congress as well as the Constitutional Convention were known to vote in direct opposition to the stated desires of the people who sent them there. It's how this nation got its start, for better or worse.

The sin, as I see it, is in propounding legislation that half of Congress hasn't even read, yet somehow firmly believes will be this wonderful, magical panacea that will suddenly have health care flowing down into the homes of every American (and millions of non-Americans) in this country. The sin is further exacerbated by not allowing each and every element of this "plan" to be dragged out into public and debated in honest, open forums where both sides can present their cases (using quotes from the actual legislation as opposed to talking points) so that we, the public, can make equally honest, open decisions about which elements of the "plan" to take out into the town squares and flog until their backsides look like so much chopped liver. Then subject them to a single-payer health care system such as they have in Canada, which is apparently so bad that the people charged with running it are furiously trying to figure out just how to "fix" it.

So let's not excoriate Rep. Massa just because he chooses to vote against his own constituents. Let's wait until he actually commits the sin, then apply the appropriate punishment.

Pelosi and Hoyer Get It Wrong

This is precisely why I can't completely ignore the Woundup. There's simply too much that requires a response, even from know-nothing conservative hacks like myself.

So Steny Hoyer and Nancy Pelosi write together for USA Today and accuse those of us who voice - loudly - our opinions against HR 3200 of being "un-American."

This just drips with irony.

First, Hoyer remarks that Harry Truman once asked Congress to guarantee the "right to adequate medical care and protection from the economic fears of sickness" for all Americans shortly after World War II. An admirable sentiment, and one that seems to resonate with many, many people. But the hard reality of it all is that nowhere in the Constitution of the United States or the Declaration of Independence do they speak to health care being one of our absolute "rights." Life and liberty, certainly, along with the pursuit (not the attainment) of happiness, but not universal health care.

I'd be willing to meet Hoyer half-way on this one: If he could somehow demonstrate to me where a government-mandated solution to anything ever resulted in a more efficient way of doing anything but drive up our national deficit, I'll agree that Congress has at least a prayer of putting together a workable "solution" to a crisis that doesn't exist for most of us.

And by the way, Steny, we're still waiting for companies to start hiring again. How's that stimulus-thingy working out for you?

Next we come to Madam Speaker. Pelosi represents probably the worst Speaker of the House we've had in living memory. Not even Newt Gingrich, who so ineptly destroyed Republican credibility with his ill-fated "Contract with America" can claim that honor. Thus we find her statement that "[d]rowning out opposing views is simply un-American" to be completely laughable.

This from the party that gave us the Chicago Seven. This from the party that harbors professional disrupters like Code Pink and ACORN. And let us not forget their standing militia, the SEIU union thugs who are even now cracking their knuckles at the thought of fresh meat at the next town hall event. "Un-American," Nancy? Surely not.

Of course, it's one thing to accuse the protesters of being nothing more than paid shills of the insurance industry. It's another thing altogether to present actual evidence that this is true. I'm still waiting to see the proof that a majority of those who have gotten "disruptive" (read: vocal) at town hall meetings are, in fact, paid operatives of the insurance magnates. I suppose I'd better not hold my breath.

I also remind Madam Speaker that it was no less a personage than Hillary Rodham Clinton who loudly proclaimed our absolute right to disagree with any administration. Just wanted to point that out.

As for hanging people in effigy, well, the Democrats would know all about that, now, wouldn't they? Haven't they burned enough Bush effigies and American flags between them to make them undeniable experts in that arena?

No, I'm sorry, Madam Speaker and Mr. Hoyer, your arguments have a hollow ring to them. Those who protest your ill-conceived "reform" legislation are merely trying to make sure you know where we stand before you force this travesty on a nation ill-prepared to handle its after-effects.

We will not go quietly.

A Kinda, Sorta, Almost Hiatus

I'm taking a step back from the Woundup for awhile. Evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.

I've started a new blogging life elsewhere. I won't link to it from here because I really don't like what the Woundup represents right now. The Woundup, as the name implies, is all about being keyed up about something or other, usually involving the stupidity that is American politics today, and writing about it as if I were some sort of rabid commentator with a point of view worth sharing with the world.

All blogs of a political nature start that way, don't they? We write missive after missive about The State of Things. We spend countless hours trying to find that very clever voice that people will just fall over themselves to read and admire, then sit around wondering why the linkage never happened.

I can't honestly say that it happened exactly that way for me, though. I never really deluded myself with the idea that my writing was of any real interest to more than a handful of my closest friends, family, and a few hangers-on.

However, I can say - with certainty - that I dislike what this experience has brought me. High levels of stress, increased sarcasm and cynicism, and an unhealthy dislike of our modern political process. I saw these aspects of my writing developing over a period of years in the waning days of the Bush administration, and have seen them rise with alarming rapidity in the opening days of the Obama administration.

I can't read about health care reform without getting angry. Nearly violently so. Not that I would ever direct this anger at anyone in the physical world. No, I really am far too pacifistic for that. But I see that anger manifest itself in these posts and feel somehow... not ashamed, but grief-stricken, as if for someone who had come to a tragic end. What a waste, people might say about Woody. He never really had a chance, did he?

Well, that may be true, if one were to judge Woody merely on the totality of these writings. I, more than anyone else including my critics, know that I am not a political analyst of any caliber. I have no legal background. I am not highly placed in corporate America so I cannot drive the market for better or for worse. I can only observe and offer my views.

Which have become angry. So very, very angry.

I despise the direction this country is taking. That's not just the Republican in me speaking. That's the experience of a man who has watched wistfully as his own party slowly but inexorably denied its own roots to become little better than the opposition at keeping America free from its increasingly socialist tendencies. I see now a country in total disarray. People who refuse to kneel at the altar of nationalized health care are branded as Nazis. Unions are mobilizing now to infiltrate the same Town Hall meetings where people asked pointed questions of their elected representatives so they can "punch back twice as hard." The mob mentality was never sharper than it is today, working on behalf of Obamacare.

And as my stress levels rise in response to these stimuli, so also does my spiritual connection with my Creator necessarily decrease. Thus I must make a decision. Continue to cull through so much material about which to write my snarky blog posts, or take a step back and try to preserve my mental and spiritual energies.

There really is no choice. The Woundup must slow to a crawl and stay there for the foreseeable future.

In the meantime, as I mentioned before, I blog elsewhere. The Inner Dad will slowly dissipate in favor of the new blog I started over at Wordpress. If you must find me, look for me there. You'll still see references to Woody, but Woody will be much more contemplative in his approach to his writing, at least until these toxins are expelled from my system.

One last thing: I do not and will not apologize for what I've written here. Those opinions were and (mostly) still are valid. They represent what I feel, particularly when pointing out the foibles of politicians and their blatantly unthinking legislation. For that reason alone, I don't believe the Woundup will ever disappear completely. There will come a time when the pen must try to outshout the sword, particularly when Congress and the President try to force socialized health care down our throats.

When that happens, I'm sure I'll have more to say. I can't deny who I am, after all, and I still occasionally get wound up.

The Ghost of Joseph McCarthy

I'm not sure if anyone else in the blogosphere has made this connection, but I think it needs to be said:

The White House is channeling the ghost of Joseph McCarthy.

This is especially ironic given that everyone in Obama's party - and not a few on the other side of the aisle - have long decried both McCarthy's philosophies and his methods. Even more ironic (not that this has any direct bearing on this thread of thought) were McCarthy's strange ties to the Kennedy dynasty back in the day.

So here's the question of the day: If it was wrong fifty-plus years ago to rat out people you thought might be sympathetic to communism in this country, how is it any more acceptable today to email the White House with names and information on those who disagree with your pet domestic policy?

After McCarthy's career imploded, Pres. Eisenhower was quoted as saying that "McCarthyism is now McCarthywasm."

I think we're back to ism now.

Open Letter to Lanny Davis

Hey, Lanny. You don't know me, but my pretend name is Woody, and I blog here at Woody's Woundup. (I know, I know... how could a conservative blogger come up with such a clever name? Just lucky, I guess.)

First, just want to thank you for your recent post over at Politico. Very informative, that was. Nice encapsulated syllabus of the entire Democrat worldview these days.

Couple of things for you, Lanny. First of all, I want you to take a good, long look at the photo in the masthead above. See it? Right next to the "Woody's Woundup" title? I want to you know, Lanny, that this is a fairly accurate photographic depiction of yours truly. Now, granted it's been a few years. The face is a bit fuller these days; the glasses are rounder, and the temples are grayer. But that's me.

So let me save you some time and trouble here. You won't find my face at any town hall events where Congresspersons are trying desperately to sell the unsellable. The best facial recognition software available to modern forensics labs won't find my mug at any such public gathering. Go ahead and try. But my name isn't Waldo and you won't find me.

Believe me, it's not that I don't support the protestors. Heavens to Betsy, if I didn't break out in hives whenever I get close to politicians in general, I'd be there. But, really, I'm more the "wait until the next day and read about it" kind of subversive. I don't believe for a minute that you Democrats are telling anything approaching the truth in this entire health care reform movement, and nothing you try to tell me in some glorified "meet the little people" get-together is likely to change my mind. (Which reminds me... that "rat out the dissenters and email us their info" thing the White House started? Nice touch.)

But I do have a few questions for you, and I'll be glad to entertain your answers.

First, can you see any real benefit to our passing legislation that most members of Congress haven't ever (and likely won't ever) read? Honestly, when a self-serving narcissist like Arlen Specter can stand up in front of a crowd and insist that we need to move "quickly" yet refuses to read the bill himself, what does this tell us about the bill? Mostly it tells us that the bill is so toxic that even looking at it will cause various cancers and, probably, sterility. Can you see why a few of us might protest this thing?

Secondly, what's your problem with protests at speeches? I mean, really, aren't you the guys who stood by and said nothing about Code Pink when they disrupted Senate deliberations? Aren't you the same folks who cheered loudly whenever Ann Coulter was attacked with pies (or worse) at her speeches? Let's be honest here, Lanny. How many microseconds would it take for the ACLU to loudly proclaim our absolute right to disagree with this administration if we were liberals hanging Bush in effigy for his Iraq war policies? Yet, where is the ACLU today to support or at least sympathize with our absolute right to declare that Obama's lynchpin domestic policy is a crock of socialism? Crickets chirping, anyone?

Finally, it's obvious you buy into the DNC's delusion that many of our protestors are nothing more than paid hacks supported by the Republican party and numerous insurance lobbies in Washington. Final question, I promise:

Any idea where I can get some of that dollar action? I could really use it since Obama will be raising my taxes at the earliest opportunity.

Hoping to hear from you soon,

Woody