Anyone who has spent a few minutes knows reading this blog knows that we are not big fans of Congressman Peter Roskam. That is no secret. Normally when we see him in video, our responses alternate between amusement and irritation. When we saw him in the video above, it was the first time we remember feeling physically ill in reaction to a Roskam appearance. It was not so much what he said as the context in which it was said and the utterly unfeeling arrogance with which Roskam delivered his message.
The occasion was a visit to Washington by Jerusalem’s mayor, Nir Barkat, in late April. Both Secretary of State Clinton and Mideast envoy George Mitchell refused to meet with him. Peter Roskam, never averse to running his own foreign policy, was happy to see him and to to make this little commercial for the Israeli apartheid regime.
The process of “growth” and “planning” that the mayor so cheerfully describes is a process of evicting Arab residents from their homes, destroying those homes, and building new Israeli settlements on the seized land. America is an ally, an ally in the project of apartheid which has been relentlessly depriving the indigenous Arab population of the West Bank and Jerusalem of their homes and their farms and their livelihoods and forcing them to live like concentration camp internees in their own country. In refusing to join with the United Nations in condemning Israel’s abuses, the United States has become complicit in those crimes.
What we find so sick-making is Roskam’s total lack of empathy or concern for the Palestinians who are being displaced (and murdered) by the Israeli regime. Roskam betrays no evidence whatsoever that he has given any thought to their plight.
Until we stop electing politicians like Roskam who are tone deaf to human rights issues and reflexively supportive of every Israeli action, there is not much hope that things will get very much better for the people of Palestine.
The following two videos are a story from 60 Minutes about a year back. They remain very relevant and give some insight into what apartheid in Palestine looks like:
The following is a video, that we found on the wonderful blog Hybrid States, from another great site SabbahReport. It gives some insight into the early history of Zionism and the occupation of Palestine.
Haven’t been able to post here in a while because our PC has been out of order and blogging from a Blackberry is not easy. We finally have a loaner.
We’ve been hearing a lot from Representative Peter Roskam lately, trash-talking the recently passed health insurance reforms that were signed into law by President Obama. Roskam has gone on record as wanting to strip his constituents of the new benefits they obtained in that historic legislation and he has been using the taxpayer-funded resources of his office and friendly corporate media to wage a misinformation campaign regarding the new law.
We were excited to find this video last night of Peter Roskam’s opponent Ben Lowe speaking on health care in America. Listen to what a real leader sounds like, then go and help Ben become a voice for working people in Congress.
6th District Representative Peter Roskam has been been demonstrating all the gravitas of a preteen girl of late in his contest with Rep. Darrell Issa and other Republicans to win the most Facebook friends and Twitter followers. While the nation faces numerous crises, we find Roskam Tweeting about episodes of Lost in an effort to become the House’s top Twit. We suspect that there might be better uses for his time and for our tax dollars.
More important though than Peter Roskam’s little popularity contest is the way Roskam is using both new social media and cooperative traditional media outlets to market lies about recent and pending legislative measures such as health reform and financial regulation. Roskam has turned the relationship between a Representative and his constituents upside down. Rather than listening to his constituents and bring their concerns back to Washington, Roskam is instead using media to market to his constituents a predetermined set of Republican objectives aimed at preserving the the GOP program of corporate deregulation that has been so disastrous to our country. And Peter Roskam has shown no reluctance to use lies and scare tactics – his endless repetitions of the lies about the fictional bailout provision in proposed financial reform bill is just one example.
It is time we had a serious leader and legislator as our Representative in Washington and not just a shill for big Wall Street banks and multi-national corporations. Someone willing to confront systematic economic injustice and the evolving global environmental catastrophe. We have such a person in candidate Ben Lowe from Wheaton. We encourage everyone to get to know Ben.
In the meantime, maybe we could make this GOP social media obsession work for constituents. How about every time Peter Roskam meets with a bank lobbyist or defense contractor he earns a Foursquare badge and we get a Twitter alert? Could revolutionize transparency in government.
Republican Peter Roskam has been a staunch supporter of the Bush-Cheney brand of militarism that has bankrupted our country and gave us an illegal and totally unnecessary war in Iraq and has left us in a quagmire in Afghanistan through neglect and mismanagement. So we were not at all surprised when we heard him on WLS AM this morning, trashing the new START treaty with renowned disarmament experts Don Wade and Roma. If you like wars and lots of them, Peter Roskam is your man. If you like military spending that exceeds that of the next highest 45 countries combined, then Peter Roskam is your man. If you think the quest for ever more destructive weapons is a good thing, then Peter’s your guy. If you want a new cold-war style nuclear arms race, Peter’s on it.
We happen to think there is a better way and we support the leadership of President Obama in taking the first step toward elimination of nuclear weapons since the original treaty was signed in 1991. And we think that Peter Roskam’s opponent, Democrat Ben Lowe of Wheaton is of the same mindset.
Ben doesn’t have the same instant access to media that Peter Roskam does, so you didn’t get to hear him on the radio this morning to present another side to the issue of the START treaty. But we did receive from his campaign this morning a statement, so here it is:
“Today’s signature and renewal of START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), sends a strong message to the world that the United States is committed to being a leader in the reduction of nuclear weapons, as well as their systems of delivery. We must not be under any pretensions that this treaty in any way eliminates the danger of massive nuclear damage to our civilization. However, we are convinced that it is a significant step in the right direction towards a world free of nuclear weapons. Ultimately this event highlights American leadership in light of rogue states heading in the opposite direction in their nuclear warfare programs, and, proposes a significant shift towards a more sensible moral compass on life and inter-government cooperation.
We are also in agreement with President’s Obama’s Nuclear Posture Review released a few days ago, and encourage the assessment of nuclear weapons as a measure of very last resort. The administrations decision to refrain from using nuclear weapons in the face of biological and chemical attack is extremely controversial but we agree with it on the principle that responding to a non-nuclear attack with a nuclear attack could easily spiral out control as the attacking enemy would be dealt a far more devastating blow than they originally inflicted upon the US, and, would be far more willing to entertain an even more disastrous nuclear response.”
We received a breathless fund-raising email from Peter Roskam last Monday. Apparently his huge stash of corporate cash is not sufficient for him to buy enough attack ads this fall to crush his unfunded grass roots Democratic opponent and he needs to beg his constituents for their hard-earned dollars so that he can return to Washington and vote against any bill that might actually help them. Here is the way Roskam’s message began:
The Democrats are out of control. Never in my life did I anticipate serving in a Congress that is poised to take over 1/6 of our nation’s economy through the procedural slight-of-hand known as reconciliation. With the Democrats’ passage of the Senate bill in the House of Representatives, the stakes for our country have gotten even higher. But the fight to defend our healthcare system from a government takeover is far from over – in fact, it has just begun.
Because that is what this election year will be – a fight against a Democrat political machine powered by liberal “back room” politics and I believe Americans like you and I have seen enough. We’re tired of watching the Administration cut deals with members of Congress to secure votes on a health care bill that the vast majority of Americans know to be irresponsible, misguided, and even harmful. Here in the Illinois 6th district, we know dirty Chicago politics when we see it, and it’s time to put an end to this madness.
Just a tad over-dramatic, no? We think Roskam should at least get some sort of literary award for fitting so many slurs into two short paragraphs. Roskam is, of course, ridiculous. There is no government takeover of healthcare, only an insurance regulation bill that will float a lot of new business to the insurance companies. Reconciliation is a parliamentary technique that Roskam’s own Republican party has used repeatedly when they held the majority. And Roskam’s Democratic opponent this fall can only wish that he had the support of a “democratic political machine” – he is, so far anyway, pretty much dependent on a small band of volunteers from the district who are fed up with Roskam’s obstruction and bullshit. If you want to see a political machine, look instead to the Republicans who control Du Page County Government and the big corporations like Exelon and Bank of America who fund Roskam’s campaigns in expectation of influence over his votes on environmental legislation and banking regulation.
Anyway, we got a smile when we received a fundraising email in response from Roskam’s opponent, Ben Lowe of Wheaton. Bent sent this out on April 1st and his message displays a great deal of plucky humor approopriate to the day:
Hi, I thought I should introduce myself.
My name is Ben Lowe.
I’m the out-of-control, liberal, left-wing, big-government, backroom deal-cutting, game-playing, dirty Chicago politician, engaged in a hostile, irresponsible, misguided, harmful, insane government takeover of health care, that your Congressman, Peter Roskam, warned you about in his recent fund-raising letter.
My naive mother is crushed to learn what I have become since I left the gentle protections of her tender bosom, for the corrupting influence of Wheaton College, the twisted machinations of suburban Wheaton, and the left-wing radicalism of a Midwestern evangelical church. My pastor-father cannot figure out where he went wrong! It must be the extreme liberalizing result of Wheaton College’s student life policies, with its exuberant embrace of swing dancing. Or perhaps the consequence of a nature-goddess worshiping environmental-studies college major and profession. Or maybe the effect of a socialist-inspired radical experiment in communal living among the drug-addled, prostitution-riddled projects of blighted Wheaton and Glen Ellyn.
Fortunately for you, Congressman Roskam is not alarmist, but reasonable, commonsensical, and conservative.
Albeit hard-up for funds. After all, he currently has only $547,000 or so left in his campaign war-chest after spending as much on an uncontested primary, and that may not be enough when stacked up against my whopping $2,000 campaign account balance. It certainly is not enough to finance limitless television and radio ads, and a steady stream of life-enhancing robocalls. Donate big, donate often, for the free government postage granted to Washington politicians, the free publicity generated by news media interviews, and the other perks of incumbency are not enough to overcome the threat that I pose to our town, our district, and our American way of life.
This is going to be a tough race. True, Obama won this district with 56% of the vote. And though his national approval rating has fallen to 46%, one can never be too careful in defense of our country from liberal political schemes and harmful government borrowing and spending (which are immeasurably more insidious than the private-sector plagues of deregulation-induced, recession-causing, finance-industry implosions of our economy, or the oil-and-power-company pollution of our environment, the health-industry abuse of the uninsured poor, or the lawyer-enriching tort-cases with enormous verdicts against medical professionals).
Health care reform, in particular, has progressed at break-neck pace in the century since that radically-liberal, communist-inspired, former-Republican Teddy Roosevelt first proposed it in 1912, along with his other nefarious strategies, such as occupational safety, child-labor laws, minimum wage, and Sundays off.
We’ve got to slow this speeding snail before it breaks the sound barrier!
Now is the time for incremental reform!
I urge you to reduce government spending today by contributing to Congressman Roskam’s campaign fund!
Or join us instead, and help bring reason and common sense back to congress. We cannot win without your support.
Yours,
Ben Lowe
Advocate for informed political debate
Democrat for Congress, 6th District Illinois
Ben is a fine person. We’ve met him. We’ve read his book. We are certain he would make an excellent Representative for the 6th District. If you are tired of the Republican obstruction and corporate money that is crippling our nation’s ability to cope the very serious problems it faces, please consider giving your time and/or money to help Ben’s campaign.
Congressman Peter Roskam, the Republican representing Illinois’ 6th Congressional District in Chicago’s western suburbs, this week launched his campaign to repeal the landmark healthcare reform legislation recently signed into law by President Obama. Roskam, who campaigned vigorously against the bill and who voted against its passage, complains that the legislation raises healthcare costs and taxes on the middle class, piles on to the national debt, and interferes with the doctor-patient relationship.
Roskam’s complaints, are, of course, baseless. The health reform legislation will provide subsidies for low- and middle-class families to make health insurance more affordable, reduces the deficit by $132 billion over 10 years, and does absolutely nothing to disrupt the relationship between patients and physicians. And it will make health insurance available to millions of working Americans who do not have access to coverage today – 32 million by 2019. Roskam, however, is determined not to let that happen. He says the plan is a radical government takeover of healthcare. It isn’t. It is simply sound insurance regulation coupled with subsidies to make insurance more affordable. In fact, as the President has pointed out, the health exchanges that will be created under the new law are very similar to a plan created by the conservative Heritage Foundation.
The Kaiser Family Foundation has produced a couple of excellent resources to help you understand what is covered under the new healthcare legislation and the timeline over which changes will take place. If we had real representation in Congress, your Congressman would be helping you to understand this information. Since he will not, we will try to help to the degree that we are able.
Roskam’s opposition to the healthcare bill appears to be rooted in large part, not so much in the details of the reform plan, but rather in an overwhelming desire to see the President fail in order to advance his own party’s electoral prospects. Roskam is also a steadfast opponent of any kind of consumer-friendly industry regulation, be it in the realm of healthcare, banking, or the environment. We have all already seen the disatrous results of the Republican deregulatory ideology in creating the recent banking and credit crisis with the resultant recession. Now Roskam, if he has his way, would replace the Democratic reform legislation with a massive deregulation of the health insurance industry that will do nothing to help working people but will help line the pockets of the insurance companies that fund his campaigns.
Though his his claims about the dangers of the healthcare reform legislation are without merit, Roskam has enormous resources at his disposal. His Congressional office gives him tremendous access to corporate media eager to help him in his misinformation campaign and his Congressional budget and franking privileges allow him to produce mailers like we saw last summer designed to scared district residents about reform. We will have to be strong and fight hard to keep him from taking away our hard-won health benefits.
We encourage you to contact Peter Roskam to voice your support for healthcare reform and to ask him to cease his efforts to take away your benefits. You can reach him at (630) 893-9670 in Bloomingdale or at (202) 225-4561 in Washington.
Roskam has also taken to Twitter as part of his efforts to kill health reform. You can talk back to him directly there. He is @PeterRoskam and he is tweeting about repeal using the tag #218hcr. We are doing are best to counteract his misinformation there.
