Pirate's Cove

Brian Debose at the Washington Times writes that "Clinton Blasts Blogger." CNN says "Clinton lays in to critic at forum." The NY Times has it as a "testy exchange on health care." Not one of them wonders if "hmm, is the question asker correct?"

(NY TIMES) LAS VEGAS – Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton just had an awfully testy exchange over universal health care with an audience member here at the National Association of Black Journalists conference – a lively moment that ended with an artful diss from Mrs. Clinton that had the audience hooting.

The audience member – who later identified himself as Kiara Ashanti, a freelance writer and blogger and a Republican – asked Mrs. Clinton why she was “still insisting” on bringing British- and Canada-style “socialized medicine” to the United States, asserting that such forms of universal care would hurt the black community.

“Oh man, I can’t answer that in 30 seconds, that was a string of misrepresentations,” Mrs. Clinton, a Democratic presidential candidate, told the gathering of more than 1,000 black reporters, editors, and other journalists.

“I have never advocated socialized medicine, and I hope all the journalists hear that,” she said. “That has been a right-wing attack on me for 15 years.”

Mr. Ashanti interrupted her with persistent criticism of government-run health care; Mrs. Clinton challenged him at one, asking if he thought Medicare was socialized medicine, and he indicated that he did.

“You are in a small minority of America, because Medicare has literally saved the lives and saved the resources of countless generations of Americans,” she said.

Mrs. Clinton praised the health systems in Canada, Britain, and elsewhere in Europe as having better outcomes and results on some performance measures than the United States. Then she offered to share her statistics with the if he wanted to introduce himself to her staff.

That is, she added, “if you’re interested in being educated instead of being rhetorical.”

Yet, none of the three sources has Shrillary explaining exactly how her plan works in detail (something she still hasn’t released. Funny how it is only Rudy who has released a full plan for healthcare, eh?). If the government is running it all, is that not socialized? Medicare is, in fact, socialized, but, as it is a small part of the overal system, it doesn’t cause massive lines, as well as long waits, to be treated. Same with Medicaid. And, as typical, she attacks rather then answers, apparently unable to educate rather then be rhetorical herself.

(CNN article) Ashanti said he was a freelance writer from Orlando, Florida, with his own political blog, and who has written for Black Enterprise, BET.com, and the Active Trader.

What did the writer think of her answer?

"Typical,” he told me. “This type of forum really works for her because there’s not a lot of time to refute anything she says. That’s what I expect. She’s not looking at the real facts. She wants to do something that gains her political points.”

Then he added, “She can’t deal with the fact that I have the knowledge to refute everything that she’s saying."

Read some of the comments at the CNN article, some are a major hoot!