If you’re having any trouble at all deciding who to vote for in VA07, check out last night’s candidate forum and your decision will be made VERY easy. I mean, right-wing-Republican Derrick Anderson just throws out complete b.s., stale Fox “News”-style talking points and flat-out lies, while Democratic nominee Eugene Vindman sounds like someone who should be in Congress. Just a few examples of Anderson’s b.s. and lies include the following (fact checks in bold/green):
- “If you think our Medicare system is bad now, if we had Medicare for All, it would destroy our system…We cannot continue to keep spending and spending and spending and I don’t think that a a government-ran [sic] healthcare company would be a good idea” (Fear mongering about “government-run healthcare,” when he himself notes that he gets his own healthcare from the Veterans Administration, and also…yeah, we’ve been hearing this fear mongering since the early 1990s with the healthcare industry’s assault on Hillary Clinton’s attempt to reform healthcare in America – it was bullsh** then, it’s bullsh** now.)
- “If we want to do a Medicare for All type system like Vice President Kamala Harris wants to do, that would destroy not only our health care system, but it would destroy the whole thing; it would be too expensive, it would be ridiculous” (Again, fear mongering that we’ve been hearing for decades from the right wing and the healthcare industry. As for Kamala Harris, she isn’t even pushing for Medicare for All, so…)
- “We’ve seen time and time again the Democrats on one side, they’ve refused to pass legislation that would actually help with mental health, mental illness.” (Actually, Democrats strongly support more funding for mental health care; Republicans, on the other hand, have voted many times – see here and here, for instance – against expanding mental health care coverage, instead using it as a talking point against taking any action to stem gun violence.)
- “The Democrats again on multiple occasions uh you know they’ve voted, they voted it for legislation that would defund our law enforcement” (That’s just flat-out false; Democrats do NOT support defunding law enforcement – period. In contrast, check out what Republicans have been up to…)
- “We need to cut spending, spending has gotten out of control… the more the government is spending the less that’s in your pocket” (That’s just flat-out false; in fact, the vast majority of US government spending is for Social Security, Medicare/healthcare, interest on the debt and national defense/security. Which of those would Derrick Anderson like to cut? Also note that the deficit exploded under Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and Donald Trump, largely because of massive tax cuts, mostly to the wealthy and to big corporations.)
- “We got to get our US energy back up and moving…we’ve had legislation passed in the House at least that would get us back to being energy independent, allowing us the opportunity to make energy here and sell it overseas instead we’re buying it from folks overseas” (This is a wild lie. In fact, U.S. energy production is currently at all-time highs, and the U.S. is actually a significant net EXPORTER of energy.)
- “We need to make sure the border is secure” (Sure, so then why did Donald Trump, House Republicans and a bunch of Senate Republicans kill a bipartisan, very tough border security bill earlier this year??? Simple: because Trump told them to do so, as he wants to campaign on “the border is broken,” ignoring the fact that he and his fellow Republicans are overwhelmingly responsible for that! By the way, on a related note, Republicans love bashing immigrants and immigration, even though those are MAJOR net positives for our economy and our country. But that’s who Republicans are, sad to say…)
In stark contrast, check out Eugene Vindman’s remarks, which were: a) fact/reality-based; b) sensible; c) constructive. Huge contrast with his right-wing-Republican opponent!
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