When it comes to healthcare, Democratic 2020 hopeful Kamala Harris seems to still be struggling to get her story straight. What she truly believes seems to vacillate, especially when she is speaking to a group of wealthy donors at a fundraiser in the Hamptons, and not the American public on the debate stage.

The Daily Beast among other outlets has reported that the Democrat had waffled once again on her support for Medicare for All. “I support Medicare for All,” she told the crowd of wealthy donors. But as you may have noticed, over the course of the many months, I’ve not been comfortable with Bernie’s plan, the Medicare for All plan.”

This despite being the cosponsor of Sanders’ “Medicare for All” bill. What really seems to have Harris backpedaling faster than a rewinding video of Lance Armstrong is one of the proposed legislation’s major features — the elimination of private insurance.

In late July, she finally released her own version of a “Medicare-for-all” bill, which, in a departure from Sanders’s proposal, would maintain a role for private insurance within a universal public system. Why would she do that? As her rival and bill’s cosponsor Bernie Sanders might say, “it’s all about the Benjamins.”

In other words, Harris, who unlike Bernie who has made elimination of for-profit insurance a key part of his vision for healthcare – is afraid to piss off wealthy donors and corporate interests. In fact, David Sirota, a Sanders campaign adviser, wrote in his newly minted newsletter, Bern Notice, “The Harris flip flop is a reminder that while Medicare for All received an enthusiastic response at Bernie’s Fox News townhall in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania — it doesn’t get that kind of response on the big dollar fundraising circuit in the Hamptons.”

The debate between Harris and Sanders on the healthcare issue is partly about a difference between Sanders’s proposal, which would eliminate private insurance, and Harris’s, which would preserve a role for insurers in the health care system. But by seizing on Harris’s remarks — and the venue where she made them — the Sanders campaign is connecting their healthcare plan to their candidate’s larger argument on corporate greed.

Harris Has Been All Over the Map on Healthcare

Harris really has been all over the place on Healthcare. Before she released “her plan,” it was nearly impossible to get any consistency from the candidate on healthcare. As stated earlier, she signed on to Sanders’s single-payer Medicare-for-all bill, and soon after, she was on the trail, publicly backing his idea to get rid of private insurance entirely, saying “let’s eliminate all of that. Let’s move on,” at a CNN town hall in January. She then walked that back, saying that she meant getting rid of “bureaucracy.”

Later on in April, at another CNN townhall, she emphasized that there would be some role for private insurance under Sanders’s bill, even though the Sanders Medicare for All Act would reduce private insurance’s role to things like cosmetic surgery or premium hospital rooms. And then, during the Democratic debate in June, Harris raised her hand when NBC’s Lester Holt asked, “Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favorite of a government-run plan?”

But she then walked that back to say she misunderstood the question, saying she personally would prefer to enroll in public insurance.

In fact, since becoming an upper-tier contender for the Democratic nomination, every time she seemingly endorsed the actual bill she cosponsored, she’s eventually walked it back.

On the other hand, Sanders has remained steadfast in painting corporate America as the “enemy of the people.” He sees a for-profit health care system as fundamentally broken. His campaign platform is centered on fighting the greed of major corporate interests, whether pharmaceutical companies, the fossil fuel industry, or private insurance industry.

In a speech about Medicare-for-all in June, he pledged to reject money from the insurance and drug companies, and called on other presidential candidates to do the same.

For Sanders’s campaign — healthcare, like everything else is all about his perceived influence of the wealthy. But, in Harris’s case he may be right given her propensity to flip-flop on the issue.

The New York Post and other news outlets are reporting that dead and gone, proven pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, once had three 12-year-old girls from poor families flown in from France as a sick birthday present for himself.

Just when you thought Epstein couldn’t get any more vile, according to newly unearthed court documents, Virginia Giuffre — who has claimed Epstein and his gal pal Ghislaine Maxwell coerced her into being a “sex slave” when she was 15 — said that the girls who were flown in were molested by the financier and returned to France the following day.

“The worst one that I heard from his own mouth was this pretty 12-year-old girls he had flown in for his birthday,” she said, according to the court documents.

“It was a surprise birthday gift from one of his friends and they were from France. I did see them, I did meet them,” she said.

She said they were a gift from Epstein’s acquaintance Jean-Luc Brunel, a model scout, according to the Daily Mail. “Jeffrey bragged afterward after he met them that they were 12-year-olds and flown over from France because they’re really poor over there, and their parents needed the money or whatever the case is and they were absolutely free to stay and flew out.”

Revelations Part of an Ongoing Case

The allegations were revealed in 2015 court papers, as part of a 2008 civil lawsuit filed by two Epstein accusers against the US following a plea deal that they argued violated the federal Crime Victims’ Rights Act.

Despite Epstein’s death, civil proceedings are allowed to continue, and the case is still ongoing. Federal Judge Kenneth Mara recently ruled that Florida federal prosecutors acted illegally when they failed to inform Epstein’s underage victims of the wrist-slap deal — which included a non-prosecution agreement that shielded the financier’s alleged co-conspirators.

Epstein, who served just 13 months in prison after pleading guilty to having sex with a minor, hanged himself in a Manhattan jail cell Aug. 10 while being held on federal sex-trafficking charges, authorities said.

Giuffre said Epstein had described to her how the girls had messaged him and performed oral sex, according to the Daily Mail.

“He went on to tell me how Brunel ‘bought them’ in Paris from their parents, offering them the usual sums of money, visas, and modeling career prospects,” she said, according to the London based news outlet.

“Laughing the whole way through, Jeffrey thought it was absolutely brilliant how easily money seduced all walks of life, nothing or no one that couldn’t be bought.”

The same civil suit filed against the Miami US Attorney’s Office alleged that young girls from South America and Eastern Europe also were recruited for sex with Epstein.

The multimillionaire financier invested $1 million to help launch Brunel’s Miami-based modeling firm MC2 in return for a “supply of girls on tap,” according to the lawsuit.

MC2 has continually denied any connection to Epstein’s crimes and previously said Brunel no longer actively works for the firm.

“I strongly deny having committed any illicit act or any wrongdoing in the course of my work as a scouter or model agencies manager,” he told The Guardian, another London paper.

Perhaps the political class is starting to realize that we the people are sick and tired of the rhetoric warfare in which differences of opinion are consolidated into warring camps.  It is bad enough that politicians are victims of strategic character assassination.  As in any “war,” the people are propagandized into evil incarnate.

During World War II, we had to temporarily hate the German people, the Japanese people – and the same during the Vietnam War.  The fact that we have good relations with these nations today gives hope for our own contemporary people-to-people hatemongers will find tolerance and acceptance in the future.

In recent days, there has been a rising call for civility.  The family of the late Senator John McCain has launched a civility project to encourage people to reach out to what is unfortunately dubbed “the other side” in reasonable dialogue.  Even the strident talking heads on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” have been talking about toning down the rhetoric.

“Morning Joe” regular Eugene Robinson, of the Washington Post, said that no one on the left believes that all Trump supporters are racists – and assumedly not sexists, xenophobes, homophobes and all those other pejoratives so often heard emanating from the left-wing of the Fourth Estate.

Really, Eugene?

One of the mainstays of left-wing commentary has been the broad-brush branding of Trump’s supporters in the vilest stereotyping imaginable.  If Robinson were to watch MSNBC – and not only appear on the network – he would have heard several hosts and panelists saying that supporting Trump makes the person a racist by extension.  Folks like Donny Deutsch, host of “Saturday Night Politics” (one of the worst political talk shows ever conceived by the left), made their rejection of civility very clear.

You cannot – emphasized Deutsch – say you like Trump policies but not his personality (people like me).  You must take the entire package.  If you are a Trump voter, then YOU are guilty of everything the left ACCUSES him – no matter how outrageous the accusations may be.  This same theme was played out across the MSNBC line-up by folks like Princeton Professor Eddie Glaude,  MSNBC utility infielder John Heilemann  and any number of other pop-up panelists.

Attacking Trump voters and supporters was not limited to the biased panels of parroting pundits but was part of the Democrat presidential candidate’s playbook.  Beto O’Rourke led the assault on 40 percent of America to be quickly followed by such fellow struggling luminaries as Julian Castro, Tim
Ryan and Cory Booker.

Sorry Eugene, you just do not know what you are talking about.  Or maybe you are just knowingly peddling a propaganda narrative – as usual.

Political incivility is largely a one-way street.  Most of the venomous verbiage is directed at Republicans, conservatives and all those who disagree with the Democrats left-wing ideology – an ideology that is embraced and promoted in round-the-clock infomercials that the elitist east coast press passes off as news.

No, I am not absolving President Trump for his contribution to the acridity of contemporary political dialogue.  I have never liked his pugnacious style and name-calling.  I think he has done damage to the cause with his bellicosity.  The problem of maligning the right is much bigger than him, however  – and preceded his presidency.  Unfortunately, he has given credence to Democrat complaints and provided a false appearance of equivalency.

It does not matter what side of the political divide you take up residency, the one thing that seems to unify most Americans – and should unify ALL Americans – is a disgust and repulsion of the degradation of political discourse.  It is sad to note that false accusations, mendacious narratives and child-like name calling have supplanted serious political dialogue.

It has been evolving over the years.  Back in the 1990s, President Clinton called out the trend toward “the politics of personal destruction.”  Perhaps the beginning goes back to the mid-1960s, when “I like Ike” (President Eisenhower for those of you who went to school in more recent years) to “Tricky Dick” – a pejorative tagged on President Nixon by the Democrat he beat in the 1950 Senate race, Helen Gahagan Douglas.

One only need read and hear the words of our national leaders of generations past to see just how badly our current political language has been corrupted.  The words of our Founders, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, and others were eloquent and poetic.

We are told by the mavens of the media that both sides – Democrats and Republicans, conservatives and liberals – use coarse language and personal attacks as a means of satisfying and solidifying their respective bases.  The assumption is that supporters of one candidate or another – one perspective or another – relish the verbal mud wrestling.

That may be true – and even that is only “maybe” – of the fringe elements on the far left and right edges of the political continuum.  It is certainly not the attitude of the vast majority of Americans on the rational left, right or in the middle.  We are sick and tired of our national leaders communicating in ways that would bring parental correction if our children talked that way.

AND, we conservatives are particularly sick and tired of being maligned as cold, callous, heartless, inhumane, toxic human beings.

What is so hypocritical of the left is that they call on us all to be more civil while they continue to mischaracterize and malign those of us on the right with full abandon.  The shallow lip-service call for civility — that was allotted less time than a commercial on MSNBC — was followed by business-as-usual brand bashing of Republicans and conservatives – and of course, Trump.

One cannot expect civility unless there is honesty.  We can respect people with different opinions – even love them.  All options for civility end, however, when we are unfairly and viciously maligned and demeaned – not by just another person, but by the major institutions of our society as a matter of form.

Political civility is not a grassroots phenomenon.  It starts at the top and can only be stopped from the top.

So, there ‘tis.

Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Ihan Omar had to unpack their bags when the Israeli government declared them to be persona non grata.  In the spirit that nothing negative in the world happens without President Trump being involved.  You know … it was his fault that a nut-case shooter killed 22 people in El Paso, that the stock market declined for a couple days and that Jeffery committed suicide – and if it is discovered that Epstein was murdered, that makes Trump even more culpable.

Of course, Tlaib and Omar hit the airwaves in outrage that members of the United States Congress would be denied a visa for a semiofficial visit.  Even Speaker Nancy Pelosi thought it was a bad move on the part of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But was it?

Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East – unless you are inclined to believe that Turkey is still one.  It is our most steadfast ally.  However, that is not how the political twins see it.  They describe the Jewish nation as a terrorist state.  They accuse American Jews of using campaign money to “buy” the support of Congress.

Though both had promised Jewish voters that they would not support the BDS movement – which stands for boycott, divestment and sanctions.  Yes, those ladies want the United States, our businesses and our people to boycott Israel, to hurt it economically by refusing to do business and to impose further damage by imposing sanctions.  If those sound like the actions we take against our adversaries, you are not wrong.

They do not want to punish Israel.  They want to destroy it.  Neither has committed to the right of Israel to exist.  They have described Netanyahu in the harshest terms. They do not want the United States to supply military equipment to Israel. They have never condemned the missile attacks by Hamas.  They have referred to violence against the Jewish state as “protests.”  They support policies that would reduce Israeli border security.  They side with Israel’s enemies.  In short, in terms of Israel, they are enemies of the state.

With Tlaib and Omar, their positions on Israel are not merely differences of opinion on matters of policies.  Au contraire.  They have a visceral and existential disdain for America’s ally in the Middle East – and more than a tinge of anti-Semitism in their remarks.

After being informed that they were on El Al Airlines’ no fly list – at least for this trip – Tlaib played the bleeding-heart card.  It seems that she would be denied visiting her ailing 90-year-old grandmother in Palestine – possibly for the last time.  She bled that heart for all it was worth in every interview.  We could feel her pain.

I did sympathize with her.  Family love is important.  It should stand apart from politics, business and most other distractions.  I sort of felt sorry for Tlaib and her grandmother. I am sure the old lady would have longed to see her famous and powerful grandchild.  Grandmas are like that.

The  Israeli government is not without heart.  It offered Tlaib a humanitarian visa to visit granny.  No official meetings.  No pomp and circumstances.  No organizing protests against the Israeli government.  Just an American citizen visiting her grandmother in a distant land.  This was the making of a Hallmark movie.

Then came the shocker.  If you were expecting to see sweet pictures of Tlaib with her arms wrapped around her frail progenitor, you will be terribly disappointed.  Tlaib would NOT be going to Israel under what she called oppressive conditions.

Apparently hugging grandma for possibly the last time was not that important after all.  With her rejection of the offer, Tlaib demonstrated that the pathos of her public statements was nothing more than concocted political theater.  I would suspect that grandma is heartbroken.  She may never see her granddaughter again – not because Tlaib cannot come to her, but because she refuses.

And as far as the initial plan is concerned, what would make Tlaib and Omar think they would be welcomed in Tel Aviv after all the things they have said and proposed against the state of Israel specifically and the Jewish people generally?

So, there ‘tis.