Well, the GOP “healthcare” bill failed to pass . . . a bill that was not substantially different than the socialistic Obamacare debacle that most of its members ran on the promise to “repeal and replace.” Sorry, but replacing it with more of the same destined-to-fail statist big-government crap that will continue to drive up costs, doesn’t count. It appears Obamacare is here to stay. (Good article on the bill here.) The Republicans are now just as guilty as the Democrats. Mitch McConnell and his minions are not merely spineless cowards, but outright frauds and liars. The sad fact is that there are only four actual conservatives in the Senate: Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Rand Paul, and Ron Johnson, who opposed the bill, or did what they could to mitigate its damage. Those are the only ones that deserve anyone’s vote or respect; the rest need to be kicked out on their fat, bloated, lying asses.
In case it wasn’t obvious before, it is now clear that there is not even a pretense of conservative principle left in the GOP. It is truly a party that stands for nothing. They can’t even come up with their own noxious policies, but lamely follow half a step behind the Democrats, while pretending to oppose them to win votes from us dumb, right-wing rubes. They can’t even agree to stop feeding the baby-butchers of Planned Parenthood with our tax dollars (and I’ve even seen “Catholics” argue that such a measure would be too harsh. After all, PP also provides mammograms – let’s not throw out the baby with . . . the dead babies).
Both parties now agree that the massive centralized Leviathon state should control everything – healthcare, education, etc., regardless of the disaster it is creating for our country. They only disagree on who can administer Leviathon more effectively.
But no matter how compromised and socialistic the Stupid Party becomes, of course, they will never, ever be socialistic enough for the Dems, who play the same game every time by going into hysterics over even the tiniest deviations from their statist schemes, decrying the weak and tepid GOP bill in apocalyptic tones. Without Obamacare, millions of people will die in the streets, the fury of theFour Horsemen will be unleashed, and the dead will walk again to feast upon the living.
Inn debates, I’ve heard similar rhetoric plenty of times from “faithful Catholics” of the holier-than-thou Religious Left (in which category I’d place even some who vote Republican). These folks are constantly wagging their fingers at any of us conservatives who dare support any restrictions or limits in the size and scope of the socialistic welfare state, shrilly accusing us of opposing “Catholic Social Teaching,” which in their minds has (wrongly) become identified with a vast and ever-expanding welfare state. Most Catholics now apparently measure civic virtue by the amount of money spent (wasted) by the federal government. (And let’s ignore entirely, of course, the unpayable burden it is placing on young and future generations. We must never let the facts get in the way of pious sentiments of “social justice.”)
They conveniently forget, of course, the teachings of Pope Pius IX, who said, “Religious socialism, Christian socialism, are contradictory terms; no one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true socialist,” or John XXIII, who declared “No Catholic could subscribe even to moderate socialism.” And more recently St. John Paul the Great
By contrast, today, many who call themselves Catholic, have swallowed the false promises of leftist socialist ideology hook, line , and sinker. Unlike the heroic and prophetic Popes and churchmen of old, many, apparently, do not only regard belief in socialist statism compatible with the Faith, but try to make it a central and indisputable article of faith. Sadly, this includes our current Marxist Supreme Pontiff, and his bureaucratic minions in the Vatican, who are so enamored of socialistic state-dictated “healthcare” that they support its decision to deprive parents of the right to try to save the life of their own child.
This year, we commemorate the 100th anniversary of Our Lady’s apparitions to the three children at Fatima Portugal in 1917. While I’ve never personally been much into apparitions, one of the reported warnings of the Blessed Mother was that unless the world was consecrated to her Immaculate Heart, the “errors of Russia” would spread throughout the entire world. It should be noted that this was at the very beginning of the Communist Revolution in Russia, and long before the Soviet Empire would become a major player on the world stage, and certainly before some poor Portuguese farm kids would have any knowledge of such issues.
While the old USSR has long collapsed, it seems the socialist philosophies undergirding Communism are now widely accepted in the West, including in the Church. A blatant, unapologetic old-school socialist like Bernie Sanders can win the majority of the “Millennial” vote (and Hillary wasn’t much better), while our “right-wing” President so hated by the Left, is himself a fan of massive government who barely even talks about scaling back the Leviathon state, much less take substantial action.
And this was accomplished without the Soviets firing a shot. Time to besiege Heaven with prayer – and fight like hell here on earth.