I am fortunate to have as my guest columnist this week the noted humorist Gerald Nachman giving us his insights into the partisan world of Washington politics.
Nachman is the author of several humor and entertainment books, most recently Right Here on Our Stage Tonight!: Ed Sullivan's America, Seriously Funny: The Rebel Comedians of the 1950s and 1960s, and Raised on Radio about the golden age of radio.
For years he was a critic and syndicated columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Daily News.
SAN FRANCISCO, October 24, 2011—President Barack Obama, who yesterday announced that a cure for cancer had been found, was dismayed at Republican legislators’ reluctance to pass a measure that would allow Americans to take advantage of a new proven vaccine that prevents the disease.
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said that while he was “pretty much in favor” of wiping out cancer, he was certain that a widespread cure would raise Medicare costs and increase taxes on insurers. “The president and I are in agreement that cancer should be eliminated, but our methods differ widely. There’s no need to burden the medical community just now. They have many other pressing medical costs to worry about.”
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) said, “I am not sure that this is something we need with so many urgent matters before Congress.” He added, “The American people, with a few exceptions, have managed pretty well without a cancer cure since the Founding Fathers. If you ask me, it’s a pretty radical idea. We first should form a subcommittee to hold hearings to look into whether curing cancer is in the best interests of the country.”
GOP presidential front-runner Rick Perry said, “It’s all well and good to knock out cancer, but this is something I think we should have a conversation about first. Do we really need more regulations against disease?”
Tea Partiers were stridently against an anti-cancer measure, claiming that Obama doesn’t really have a cure “and is once again trying to pull something over on the American public,” in the words of one Tea Party member. “He fooled us once, with his counterfeit birth certificate.”
Michele Bachmann came out against anything that involves a vaccine for young women. “I had a small pox vaccine as a kid that left a lifelong scar on my arm. No thank you, Mr. Obama!”
Former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, before a cheering throng of women at a shopping mall in Goose Hollow, Ark., commented: “I’ve known many people who have had cancer and survived, all thanks to God. I’d sure as shootin’ rather put my faith in the Almighty than in some black guy nobody ever heard of until a few years ago. This whole cancer cure thingy sounds pretty darn fishy to me, just a way to promote more needless Obamacare.”
Mitt Romney told an audience, “While I was governor of Massachusetts, we took on cancer and held our own, I’m proud to say. If elected president I promise to be equally anti-cancer and equally proud to say so.”
Ron Paul, GOP candidate, remarked, “I’m a doctor, so I’ve always been very much against disease in any form, but, hey, if people die, they die.”
President Obama said he understood conservatives’ wariness about the anti-cancer cure and hopes to work with Republicans to get it passed. “I’m sure we can find areas of agreement, such as saving several million lives, but I realize this is a very complex matter.”
To contact Catherine Poe, see above. Her work appears in Ad Lib in the Communities at the Washington Times. She can also be heard on the Democrats for America's Future.
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