David Rodeback's Blog

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Two Questions, Please, Senator

If enough others have the same questions, Senator Robert Bennett has a potential problem in 2010.

If I could ask Senator Robert Bennett (R-Utah) two questions and get candid, detailed answers on the record, those two questions would be:

1. You're one of the top Republicans on the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee. Where were you before the walls caved in? If Republicans, including President Bush, saw the growing troubles with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and even warned of disaster ahead, why didn't you and yours escalate those warnings until people started listening? Why not dance in a Speedo on the Capitol steps, or send up actual flares (preferably out of doors), if that's what it took? Does your pulling up short in this crucial respect have anything to do with being the leading Republican recipient of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over a ten-year period? What did Fannie and Freddie and their employees get for their $107,999?
2. What are you thinking, cosponsoring a bill which establishes a universal right to health insurance? S. 391 includes this congressional finding in Section 2:

To accompany this new focus on staying healthy and personal responsibility, our government must guarantee that all Americans receive private affordable health coverage that can never be taken away.

Financing this guarantee should be a shared responsibility between individuals, the Government, and employers.

If you create a universal, government-backed and -funded right to health insurance, isn't the game basically over? How could Congress ever bring itself to take away such a right, having once granted it? Doesn't that particular road lead inexorably to government-run health care?

In the absence of satisfactory answers to these two questions, my vote in a possible 2010 primary, which should have been safely yours, Senator Bennett, is very much up for grabs.

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