1. The Lie
This past week Senator Cruz met with some of his constituents in his home state and, instead of telling the uninsured among them that their lives are about to get better, he continued his fight against the Affordable Care Act. In fact, he told them the ACA is so awful that even Congress doesn't want any part of it. "President Obama just granted all of Congress an exception. And he did it because Harry Reid and the Senate Democrats who passed this thing came begging and said, 'Please, please, please let us out of Obamacare.' This thing ain't working."
what eye thynk: This lie is so blatant that even I am amazed. The truth is that Republican Senator Chuck Grassley put forward an amendment to the ACA in 2009 that specifically requires members of Congress to purchase their health insurance through ACA marketplaces in their home states. The amendment was accepted by all members--both Democrat and Republican--of the Senate Finance Committee without a single negative vote. Mr. Cruz is not only lying about the exemption, he is denying Senator Grassley credit for getting his amendment into the law and disregarding his fellow Republicans who supported it.
The truth is that members of Congress and their support staff are entitled to employer, (in this case, the U.S. government), paid health care. Under the ACA, members of Congress and their staffs will purchase insurance through their home state's ACA insurance exchange and their employer, (the government), will pay the cost of that policy. This does not mean they are exempt from the ACA. It's not any different from a private sector employee who chooses a health care plan from those offered by his company and gets that plan paid for by the employer.
2. The Birth Certificate
Republicans have questioned President Obama's legal right to be President since his first campaign in 2008. The birthers are still questioning it. See my post "The Birthers Are Back":
http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4896581534064961420#editor/target=post;postID=7901311533230850835;onPublishedMenu=posts;onClosedMenu=posts;postNum=1;src=link
Now it turns out that Senator Cruz has a bit of a birth certificate problem himself. He was born in Calgary, Canada of an American mother and a Cuban national father. His mother's U.S. citizenship automatically grants U.S. citizenship to Mr. Cruz. His place of birth also grants him Canadian citizenship. Mr. Cruz claims he was unaware of this, (really?), until this past week, when he announced that he would renounce his Canadian citizenship.
what eye thynk: So let's compare...
President Obama Senator Cruz
Place of birth: Hawaii, U.S.A. Place of birth: Calgary, Canada
Mother: U.S. citizen Mother: U.S. citizen
Father: foreign national Father: foreign national
Citizenship at birth: American Citizenship at birth: American
The U.S. law requiring that our President be a natural born citizen has always been loosely interpreted to give natural born status to anyone born of at least one American parent no matter where the birth actually takes place. This interpretation has been in place since the first meeting of our Congress in 1789. At that time, a Mr. Smith's citizenship was questioned. It was determined that, "It is an established maxim that birth is a criterion of allegiance. Birth however derives its force sometimes from place and sometimes from parentage, but in general place is the most certain criterion."
So, while there is nothing in either man's birth that would legally prohibit him from becoming President of the United States, in the words of our forefathers, Mr. Cruz would seem to have more of a "birther" problem than Mr. Obama. California conservative Orly Taitz, President of Defend Our Freedoms and an anti-Obama birther crusader, seems to agree with me: "Clearly there is an issue of eligibility. It's basically the same issue as Obama has."
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Pay back...it's a bitch.
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