Medicare is Tyranny

While I didn't think that I could love Rachel Maddow anymore than I already do, catching the 1am rerun of 'Meet the Press' may have just made that happen.

She went head to head with Dick Armey, former House Majority Leader, and the fireworks started right off the bat. Armey, who resigned this week from DLA Piper because of the controversy surrounding his "grassroots organization," disavowed any responsibility for the lack of civility at the town hall meetings that are being held across the country and compared it to MoveOn.org running an ad comparing Bush and Hitler. (Which is not true, by the way. The ads in question were submitted to MoveOn in a create-your-own ad contest they held, and were quickly pulled and never used or promoted by the organization.)

Maddow then points out that some of the organizations (like Americans for Prosperity) involved in promoting these protests are going around the country "not only comparing health care reform to Hitler, but comparing it to Pol Pot and Stalin, saying 'put the fear of God in your members of Congress.'"

The good stuff starts about 5 minutes and 50 seconds in:

After Dick Armey says that he accepts no responsibility for the lack of civility, Maddow then directs him to the Tea Party Patriots website where it seems to be featuring the outbursts on its front page as if celebrating them as the goal of this organizing. Dick don't like facts.

Then things start to get really fun with this little exchange:

Maddow: Do you really think that there’s a major uprising of seniors wanting to get out of Medicare? I know you’re suing the government for your right personally to get out of Medicare.

Armey: Right.

Maddow: But do you really think that’s the problem that Medicare? That seniors hate Medicare and they want out?

Armey: No, I didn’t say that. Most seniors...I was talking to my minister the other day. My minister says, “Dick, I’m so fortunate I’m in Medicare.” I said, “Bless you, my friend that you get to be in it if you choose to be so.” But if you give a government program and you let me choose to be in or choose to be out, that’s generosity. If you force me in, irrespective of my desires, that’s tyranny. Now, if Medicare’s $46 trillion in the red, with no idea how we’re going to pay for it, why do they not let people who don’t want to be in out?

Maddow: This is a really important point. The anti-healthcare reform lobby thinks that Medicare is tyranny, OK? This is an—I mean, you said in 1995 that “Medicare is a program I would have no part of in a free world.”

Armey: Right. Absolutely right.

Maddow: You said in 2002, “We’re going to have to bite the bullet on Social Security and phase it out over a period of time.”

Armey: And I’m going to enumerate exactly what I’m talking about. Medicare...

Maddow: Americans need to know this is your position and this is the position of the anti-healthcare reform lobby.

One of the leading voices and primary organizer of the opposition to health care reform believes that Medicare and social security shouldn't exist.