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Saturday, January 16, 2010

John Helmberger, CEO Minnesota Family Council, wants us to pray for election in Massachusetts of one who would make healthcare reform even harder.

This Helmberger fellow emails anti-progress anti-good sense propaganda from a like-minded soul back east:

Subject: Personal Message from Kris Mineau: Prayer for MA

IN ONLY 4 DAYS, Massachusetts will have a critical election on Tuesday, January 19, to fill the vacant US Senate seat of the late Ted Kennedy. Until now, all 6 US Congressmen and 2 US Senators from Massachusetts have been 100% liberal and extremely supportive of the homosexual and abortion agendas (with the exception of 2 Congressmen being nominally pro-life).
For the first time in over 50 years, we have a viable conservative running, Scott Brown, who, as a state senator, stood against same-sex marriage and the radical abortion agenda of Planned Parenthood. Conversely, his opponent, State Attorney General Martha Coakley, is rabidly pro-abortion and pro-homosexual. She is even more liberal on these issues than Ted Kennedy was.
If Scott Brown wins, he will be the 41st vote in the Senate to block the Health Care Bill, so this election has HUGE national consequences. [...]
The Dems are in sheer panic and are pulling out all stops. They have unleashed a number of personal attack ads and Bill Clinton is scheduled to hold a rally with Coakley in Boston tomorrow. The Coakley campaign has asked Obama to come but he as yet has not publicly responded.
PLEASE PRAY FOR:
1. Scott’s campaign message of fiscal and social conservatism to reach the large block of “independent” voters in Massachusetts who comprise some 50% of registered voters.
2. Conversely, for Martha Coakley's message of continuing Ted Kennedy's liberal policies to turn off those same voters.
3. Coakley is now airing a deluge of negative attack ads; pray that voters would see them for what they are and that Scott continues to hold the high ground as a well-liked personable guy with a loving wife and two beautiful daughters.
4. Health and strength for Scott and his family. He’s going 24/7 and getting tired.
[...]


Helmberger's email requests:

We're passing along the following urgent appeal for prayer from our good friend Kris Mineau, President of Massachusetts Family Institute. The prayer request concerns the critical special election on January 19 to fill the U.S. Senate seat formerly held by the late Ted Kennedy. As Kris explains in his appeal, this special election has great significance for the entire country, which is why we're passing the appeal on to you. Please join us in praying for what is good and right and true to be upheld in this election.

Thank you for standing with us and our friends in Massachussetts!


[italics added] So why are you still standing? Because Helmberger said "standing with us?"

You pray against progress standing up? Because some guy from the Family Council says to?

Kneel and supplicate. Ignore Helmberger's unorthodox style. Pray over east coast politics the way you've learned, since learning it as a child means it is a better way to get secular political affairs arranged than praying standing next to Helmberger, or whatever he means. While at it, pray you don't get sick or in an auto accident, healthcare being in the mess it currently is. Pray for a brain.

______UPDATE______
While seeking divine intervention in Massachusetts politics, would you consider praying not only for a Vikings victory against Dallas in the playoffs tomorrow, but, please, pray for one beating the point spread, as I am considering wagering a bet.

_______FURTHER UPDATE_______
I went to this Scott Brown guy's website, and it's disturbing, this sentence:

I am a free enterprise advocate who believes that lower taxes can encourage economic growth.


That sounds RINO to me.

A true believer tea specialist "conservative" would say, "I am a free enterprise advocate who has no doubts that lower taxes will cause economic growth."

Scott Brown, justify yourself. Why all the weasel words qualifying your "beliefs"?

That comes across like Michele Bachmann saying she wants to shrink big government but in all her years in DC she has never offered a bill to reduce Congressional salary and benefits.

Where else would a true believer start?

Where else to start ---- Unless the words are there but not the caring -- not caring enough to not want to come across as some kind of hypocrite, as one mouthing slogans to TV talking heads, but not really ready to push for an inside out, start at ground zero true-believer appraoch.

Don't we need real 100% Tea Party zealots, plenty of them so things get fixed, and not just one more glib speaking RINO from Massachusetts?

Should we pray half-way?

________FURTHER UPDATE__________
Strib carries AP coverage here, this excerpt:

At the White House, spokesman Robert Gibbs was unequivocal that Obama's effort would prove successful. "As you heard the president say yesterday, we're going to get health care done," he said.

Not everyone was quite so certain, particularly given poll results from Massachusetts that showed Republican Scott Brown within reach of an upset over Democrat Martha Coakley in a three-way race.

"If Scott Brown wins, it'll kill the health bill," said Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass, reflecting that the Republican would provide opponents of the health care bill a decisive 41st vote to uphold a filibuster and block passage in the Senate. Frank predicted Coakley would ultimately prevail and thus preserve the essential 60-vote Senate majority. Obama hurriedly scheduled a weekend campaign trip to the state.

Even so, Frank's remark sent shudders through the ranks of Democrats.

The president called on Congress in his inaugural address a year ago to send him legislation that would remake the health care system, including expansion of coverage, new regulations on industry and unprecedented measures to slow the rise in health care costs generally.


What would the political fallout be, next general election, should GOP candidate Scott Brown win, and the GOP by having 61 seats kills healthcare revision? Reform was promised and the bill drafts bouncing around are short of real reform. If the GOP kills even that, it seems they would be vulnerable to being held accountable for their unwavering opposition to progress and basic moral decency with regard to everyone having fair access to medical care. It seems they could be pilloried big time. But aside from that, citizens would be left as screwed as now, the status quo would continue, and is that an objective of the Nelson and Lieberman types? If so, they stand in the way, and as part of the problem not the solution, they should be swept aside - were voters they are answerable to intelligent enough to see this.

As to the two parties positioning their future in the next election, it is unclear whether the Dems are as sincere as Bere Rabbit in Wind in the Willows, about not wanting to be thrown into "that brier patch." In effect, is it all more politics as usual rather than responsible attention to national needs and decently fair and achievable goals?