TN Congressman Sells-Out on Healthcare

Received in my email today from Gun Owners of America - TN Residents need to pay attention and act:

Contact Senators Alexander and Corker
-- Tell them you don't want them to follow Rep. Gordon's cowardly example

Gun Owners of America E-Mail Alert
8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151
Phone: 703-321-8585 / FAX: 703-321-8408
http://www.gunowners.org

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Things were going so well! Perhaps too well.

It looked like the government-run health/anti-gun database created by the stimulus bill would not be extended to the most private medical records of every man, woman, and child in America!

It seemed like the health care bill was on life support.

But who should come riding to the rescue of socialized medicine, rationing, and a federal takeover of health care decisions but ... Tennessee's Bart Gordon.

On Friday, Rep. Gordon voted for a do-nothing "compromise" which allowed the massive health abomination to pass out of Energy and Commerce Committee and go to the House floor after the August recess.

Now that Gordon has sold out, it is imperative that we keep Senators Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker from following Gordon's cowardly example. Tennessee's congressional delegation may be pivotal in determining whether:

* Your most private medical records are placed in a health/anti-gun database operated by the federal government;

* Most Americans lose their current insurance coverage due to HHS-drafted standards that their current insurance fails to comply with [sections 123 and 124 of the House Obama care bill; section 143 of the Kennedy-Dodd bill in the Senate].

Even if the "compromise" that Gordon voted for were a wonderful bill -- which it isn't -- it will just move the process along so that a conference committee controlled by Nancy Pelosi will throw out all of the "compromises" and reinsert whatever she wants.

Once the process reaches that point -- and we realize that the final product is OUR WORST NIGHTMARE -- it will be viewed as having unstoppable momentum and our tools for fighting it will be gone.

The current health care proposals would destroy gun owner privacy safeguards. These bills would put the Obama administration in charge of determining what kind of insurance virtually every American is required to have -- and likewise, what information Americans are required to provide to that database.

Gun owners already know the dangers of a computerized health care database run by anti-gun bureaucrats. Just consider what is occurring right now to our veterans.

The Department of Veterans Affairs has its own nationalized healthcare system with centralized records. Since 1999, over 150,000 veterans, mostly combat veterans, have lost their Second Amendment rights. The reason? A diagnosis by a doctor that the person deals with issues like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. These veterans committed no crime, were not tried in a court of law, served their country honorably, yet lost their gun rights for life because they told a doctor that they sometimes had nightmares about what they saw in combat.

If our veterans can lose their gun rights based on the diagnoses of a psychiatrist, we're all in trouble if Obama-care comes to the rest of the country. And to our knowledge, none of the compromise talks on Capitol Hill right now would remove gun owners from Obama's crosshairs.

By the way, Gordon's "compromise" contains a phony assurance that the bill's vastly understated trillion-dollar price tag would be reduced by an unspecified and illusory hundred billion.

Some cynics had predicted that so-called moderate Democrats like Gordon were "Pelosi puppets," who would wiggle around a little at the end of their strings, before dutifully dancing to Pelosi's tune. And they were right about Bart Gordon.

The question is: Will Senators Alexander and Corker do the same thing? They could well be the deciding votes in the Senate.

ACTION:

Contact Senators Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker. Ask them to stand firm against gun control ... and against socialized medicine, including the Finance Committee's bill -- and not to sell out to cowardly compromises in order to please the liberal elite.

NOTE: You can "copy and paste" the pre-written letters into the appropriate webforms that are provided to you below.

CONTACT INFORMATION:

(1) Senator Lamar Alexander

Webform: http://alexander.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.Home
Phone: 202-224-4944, or call the Capitol switchboard toll-free at 1-877-762-8762

(2) Senator Bob Corker

Webform: http://corker.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContactInformation.ContactMe
Phone: 202-224-3344, or call the Capitol switchboard toll-free at 1-877-762-8762

----- Pre-written letter -----

Dear Senator:

You may be the pivotal vote in determining whether:

* My most private medical records are placed in a health/anti-gun database operated by the federal government;

* Most Americans lose their current insurance coverage due to HHS-drafted standards that their current insurance fails to comply with [sections 123 and 124 of the House Obamacare bill; section 143 of the Kennedy-Dodd bill].

So it is particularly alarming that Tennessee Congressman Bart Gordon voted for a face-saving do-nothing "compromise" which allowed the massive health abomination to pass out of Energy and Commerce Committee and go to the House floor after the August recess.

I urge you to stand firm against government-controlled medicine, and to not follow Gordon's cowardly betrayal of his Tennessee constituents.

Sincerely,