Strange goddamned bedfellows

Richard Mellon Scaife (from Wikipedia):

 Scaife’s publications were substantially involved in coverage against then-President Bill Clinton.

• Scaife was the major backer of The American Spectator, whose Arkansas Project set out to find facts about Clinton and in which Paula Jones’ accusations of sexual harassment against Clinton were first widely publicized.

• In a 1999 series of articles on Scaife and foundations that support conservative causes, the Washington Post named a close Scaife associate, Richard Larry, and not Scaife himself as the man who drove the Arkansas Project.

Regardless of his role, the project not only accused Clinton of financial and sexual indiscretions (some later verified, others not), but also gave root to hyperbolic conspiracist notions that the Clintons collaborated with the CIA to run a drug smuggling operation out of the town of Mena, Arkansas and that Clinton had arranged for the murder of White House aide Vince Foster as part of a coverup of the Whitewater scandal. The possibility that money from the project had been given to former Clinton associate David Hale, a witness in the Whitewater investigation, led to the appointment of Michael J. Shaheen as a special investigator. Shaheen subpoenaed Scaife, who testified before a federal grand jury in the matter.

So involved was Scaife in efforts against Clinton that many Democrats believed Hillary Clinton’s statement condemning a “vast right-wing conspiracy” against her husband was a direct reference to Scaife himself. President Clinton later admitted to sexual indiscretions, but the other allegations that came out of the Arkansas Project were never proven.

Not a big fan of the Clintons, y’know?  But when he offered her a chance to flog the Jeremiah Wright story, she came running.  Talking Points Memo dug up this picture, with Clinton calmly sitting next to Scaife while delivering her line on Wright.

 

I know saying that Hillary Clinton will do anything to get elected is supposed to be beyond the pale (and even OMG MISOGYNIST), but causally chatting with a guy who once accused you of covering up the murder of one of your friends on the off chance that it’ll hurt a fellow member of your political party is, well, pretty close to “doing anything to win” isn’t it?

This is the kind of thing that makes kids seem non-lame

I mean between all the “cleaning up another human being’s shit” and “having some ungrateful whelp make exactly the same stupid mistakes that you made at their age even when you told them not to,” at least you could indoctrinate them with They Might Be Giants.

But at least it’s not going to the gummint!

The Washington Post has an interesting story about how rising healthcare costs are eating up already-stagnant wages

The main reason: spiraling health-care costs have been whacking away at their wages. Even though workers are producing more, inflation-adjusted median family income has dipped 2.6 percent — or nearly $1,000 annually since 2000.

Employees and employers are getting squeezed by the price of health care. The struggle to control health costs is viewed as crucial to improving wages and living standards for working Americans. Employers are paying more for health care and other benefits, leaving less money for pay increases. Benefits now devour 30.2 percent of employers’ compensation costs, with the remaining money going to wages, the Labor Department reported this month. That is up from 27.4 percent in 2000.

Dear Morons Who Are Afraid that Government Healthcare Means New Taxes:

YOU ARE STILL PAYING FOR HEALTHCARE WHEN YOUR EMPLOYER “GIVES” IT TO YOU.

This is one of the single most annoying things about American politics. People freak out about “paying new taxes” for healthcare but they just grumble as health insurers and employers lump more and more costs onto them.  This isn’t a market commodity like sneakers or luxury cars where you can just choose not to buy the good or go for a lower quality alternative.  Sooner or later, you are going to get sick and need a damn doctor.   When you go to that doctor, there is a pretty stringent standard of care that he has to adhere to, without much room for the corner-cutting that produces market segmentation in other industries.  What’s more, our current balkanized system makes healthcare more expensive, not just for the idiots who think they’re invincible, but for everyone.