Thursday, March 05, 2009

The pitter patter

Of rats’ feet over broken glass.

ONE

Tim Pawlenty, our dear Governor Pepsodent: “We must tighten our belts.” One of the ways Governor Pepsodent wants to tighten his belt is around the necks of people insured under Minnesota Care – or ought to be. In six years of Pepsodent-era budget solutions (the last biennium, the current one that ends June 30th, and the next one) nearly a billion dollars will have been raided from the health care access fund. As Spot’s post at the link recounts, the state’s Medicaid recipients won’t see a similar decrease in funding because we’ll be getting some extra Medicaid money from the feds with strings attached that restrict the ability of the state to reduce Medicaid coverage. But that’s the only reason.

And don’t say that the budgets are the Legislature’s fault. Unless you mean the part led by Marty “the comb over” Seifert:

House Minority Leader Marty Seifert, R-Marshall, vowed that his House GOP caucus would uphold any gubernatorial vetoes on tax increases, with no reprise of the override DFLers pulled off last year on the gasoline tax.

Yes, the apostates have been purged. Oh, and speaking of apostates.

Spot has never questioned – on the blog, anyway – the sincerity of anybody’s religious belief. Until now. If Pepsodent’s a Christian, Spot is the Sun King. Oh, we’re not talking about whether Pepsodent believes that Jesus will save his quivering, puckered arse when he dies. His is the faith of the Get Out of Jail Free, Rapture Ready crowd. Never mind the social gospel of Jesus: the Beatitudes or attending to the hungry, thirsty and the imprisoned as though they were Jesus himself. And never mind Jesus’ instructions to Peter in the Gospel of John: “If you love me, feed my sheep.” In other words, don’t just say it: do something about it.

It is also written in James, another book of the New Testament, “Faith without works is dead.” That’s not a passage that’s very popular with the Good News tribes of Christians like dear Pepsodent. But it’s high time that some of the members of the other tribes began to rub the noses of sanctimonious moral ciphers like Pepsodent and his fellow travelers in the temporal obligations of Christians.

Governor Pawlenty, Spot’s calling you out for the cardboard Christian you are. Want to debate it? Spot says anywhere, anytime.

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