Hard Hearts
2012-06-21 - by
Republicans are determined to define themselves as hard-hearted – and hypocritical.
They give two explanations for cutting out $10 million to compensate people who were forcibly sterilized by the state.
The first is: We can’ afford it. Let’s figure here. The budget is $20 billion. $200 million is 1 percent of that. So $10 million is one-half of one-tenth of a percent of the budget.
The other explanation came from Senator Don East: “You just can’t rewrite history. It was a sorry time in this country. I’m so sorry it happened, but throwing money don’t (sic) change it, don’t make it go away. It still happened.”
Well, we do have a precedent in America for compensating victims. It’s called the civil courts, where you can sue for damages when you’ve been hurt or wronged. And North Carolina once had, and maybe still does, a fund to compensate crime victims. The wrong still happened, the money don’t change it and don’t make it go away, but we do “throw money” at wrong.
In the end, the Republicans can’t escape the perception that they cut the money because it would go to the kind of people who don’t vote for them.
Then there’s the hypocrisy. Fox News commentators rail endlessly about how President Obama is trying to take away our freedoms as Americans. North Carolina took away a significant amount of these Americans’ freedoms. Wasn’t that wrong, and isn’t $10 million a reasonable effort to right a wrong?
Thom Tillis thinks so.
Hard Hearts
2012-06-21/
Republicans are determined to define themselves as hard-hearted – and hypocritical.
They give two explanations for cutting out $10 million to compensate people who were forcibly sterilized by the state.
The first is: We can’ afford it. Let’s figure here. The budget is $20 billion. $200 million is 1 percent of that. So $10 million is one-half of one-tenth of a percent of the budget.
The other explanation came from Senator Don East: “You just can’t rewrite history. It was a sorry time in this country. I’m so sorry it happened, but throwing money don’t (sic) change it, don’t make it go away. It still happened.”
Well, we do have a precedent in America for compensating victims. It’s called the civil courts, where you can sue for damages when you’ve been hurt or wronged. And North Carolina once had, and maybe still does, a fund to compensate crime victims. The wrong still happened, the money don’t change it and don’t make it go away, but we do “throw money” at wrong.
In the end, the Republicans can’t escape the perception that they cut the money because it would go to the kind of people who don’t vote for them.
Then there’s the hypocrisy. Fox News commentators rail endlessly about how President Obama is trying to take away our freedoms as Americans. North Carolina took away a significant amount of these Americans’ freedoms. Wasn’t that wrong, and isn’t $10 million a reasonable effort to right a wrong?
Thom Tillis thinks so.