"You lie!"

Dear MoveOn member,

Last night, President Obama challenged Congress to "meet history's test" and finally fix our broken health care system. He pledged to seek common ground between Democrats and Republicans, and assured them all: "My door is always open."

Republicans responded by heckling, booing, and hissing. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) screamed out "You lie!" as the President defended his health care plan against false right-wing attacks.

We can't afford to let right-wing extremists like Joe Wilson hold health care reform hostage. As Obama put it, "the time for games has passed. Now is the season for action."

My MoveOn We're Not a Democracy Response:

Sure, MoveOn, I'll go along with your little scheme. You may not like my letter, though. Here goes:

Dear CONgress,

I've been instructed by the people at MoveOn that I'm supposed to tell you that we aren't to let the right-wing extremists shut down helath care reform. So I'm doing that, but I have a caveat: don't let left-wing extremists define what "reform" is.

I'm sure you didn't read the bill. I don't blame you. HR3200 is over a thousand pages long. It's written in legaleze. It takes a law degree and a team of legal experts to decipher and even then you'll only get half of it.

I can tell you this, though... there is no "reform" in that bill. Just more garbage, but on such a scale that it will make the Homeland Security Act, the USA PATRIOT Act and the Cash For Clunkers program look downright simplistic.

So I urge you to ignore both extremists wings (right AND left) and stick to your guns about ignoring the health care issue altogether until someone brings up something that matches the dictionary definition of "reform."

Here's that definition, so you don't have to look it up:
re⋅form
  /rɪˈfɔrm/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [ri-fawrm] Show IPA
–noun
1. the improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, unsatisfactory, etc.: social reform; spelling reform.