MadamaB's Mailbox: It's Dead, Jim.

Irony, that is. Just look what our Dear Leader done wroted to me in duh eeeeeemail!

The subject is: "What You're Doing is Working."

(pause for crying, laughing, pounding table and biting down on leather strop)

Okay. Okay. I'm a little calmer now. He continued:

I wanted to take a moment to thank you directly for the outstanding work you've been doing for health reform. I can tell you that your voice is heard in Washington every day. I see how your efforts are moving us toward victory.

OMG! We're going to have Medicare for All???? WOW! Obama, you ROCK. I was so, so wrong about you!!!

Oh. Uh, never mind. I read a little more, and folks, I hope you've got your barf buckets ready.

During moments like this, I believe it's important to remember why we have worked so hard for so long. That's why I spoke to the country Monday at a gathering in Ohio and said it plainly: I'm here for Natoma.

Natoma Canfield is like most of us: She works hard, and tries to do what's right. Years ago, she had battled back from cancer, so she always maintained health insurance in case she ever really needed it again. But because of her medical history, the insurance company kept raising her deductible and her premiums.

Last year alone, Natoma paid over $10,000 in monthly premiums and co-pays, while her insurance company chipped in just $900. And then they hiked up her rates another 40%. She simply couldn't afford it -- she had to cancel her policy. That's when she wrote to me. I read her letter, and shared her story with insurance company CEOs as another reason why the system has to change.

That was two weeks ago. Then, just last week, the unthinkable happened: Natoma collapsed, and was rushed to a hospital. It's leukemia -- the cancer has returned. Now she's in the hospital, worried sick not just about her condition, but how she'll financially survive.

So why am I still in this fight? Simple. I'm here for Natoma.

I'm here because of the countless others who have been denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions. I'm here for the small business owners forced to chose between health care and hiring. I'm here for the folks who are forced to watch helplessly as their premiums skyrocket with no reason or recourse

Oh, now I see where you're going with this, Barack Dear. It's...The Bracelet Story, Part Deux!

You all remember when Obama was debating McCain (or maybe you don't because the whole thing was so dang dreary)? Check this out:

"I've got a bracelet too! It's uh uh uh..." Remember how he didn't remember the name on the bracelet until he looked at it? And remember how he promised to bring our troops home, one-two combat brigades a month, and proposed we withdraw them in 2008, uh, 2010, uh 2011, oh crap, we don't know when the fuck they're coming home now?

We all know that when Bill Clinton started pointing out that Obama had, in fact, no real history of opposing the war and that his whole position on Iraq was nothing but a fairy tale, the Obama campaign resorted to a tactic they would resort to over and over again: Bill and Hillary were RACIST111!!!! They had to do SOMETHING, because nasty ol' Bill was showing the ugliness behind the pretty story - the fact that Obama was only pretending to be a dove in order to have some basis, no matter how thin, for his candidacy. Otherwise, who the hell would have given him a second glance? He would have been a fourth-rate Kucinich who didn't even have a record to back up his alleged liberalism.

Of course, once Obama attained his lofty position, all pretense of caring about the welfare of our soldiers was instantly abandoned. As I referred to in the link above, it didn't take long after his inauguration before he decided that the agreement George W. Bush had made was good enough for him. Full withdrawal by December 31, 2011, "combat troops" withdrawn by August 2010. (Anyone believe this will still happen? If so, I've got a slightly used Unity Pony to sell you, stage right.)

And so it goes with poor Natoma, this woman whose story Obama is shamelessly, heartlessly and robotically telling all over the country. You think he could remember her name without a TelePrompter? Je pense que non. That's because just as candidate Obama used that bracelet as a prop to sell a fairy tale about his war opposition, so is Obama now using Natoma as a prop to sell a fairy tale about his Health Whatever bill, which actually, has nothing in it at all to remedy Natoma's situation.

I have two reactions to extreme rage. One is, I have a ranting meltdown. The other is, snark.

So here's my snark: I will now predict how Obama will sell his upcoming "education reform" bill, which, according to what I've been reading, will be an even more onerous, yet less well-funded "No Child Left Behind":

I'm here because of little Timmy. Timmy's school has textbooks from 1969. There is only one working bathroom for 400 children. The walls are crumbling and moldy. Won't you help Timmy get a better education? Won't you support education reform?***

***helping Timmy not included

You know what else is dead, besides irony? Any chance of my believing anything any Dem says, ever again, with the possible exception of Hillary Clinton (and even then, only when she's talking about women's rights and equality). I swear to Goddess, if Obama told me it was raining outside, I'd happily leave my umbrella at home.

The Democrats (yes, even the once-sainted Kucinich) are now officially, finally and completely a waste of my fucking time. What to do next? I'm not sure yet, but you can be damn sure I'll think of something.