Yahoo Watch: Teresa Collett

Over at American Catholic, they have a video ad for a woman running for Congress in Minnesota.

Teresa Collett says she is for limited government and says that the Founders “certainly didn’t anticipate that the federal government would become our doctor and our health care provider.” This is true. The Founders also didn’t anticipate that the government would need to build an Interstate Highway system because there were no cars, nor that NASA would be one of the functions of the federal government, nor that we would need a Civil Rights division of the Justice Department to enforce laws protecting the rights of blacks whom those Founders still viewed as only three-fifths of a person for purposes of the census, and as property for all other purposes.

But, Collett is not simply misunderstanding history. She is lying. No one, repeat no one, intends for the government to become anyone’s doctor. And, apart from the Veterans Administration, which I assume this candidate does not want to eliminate, no one is suggesting that the federal government be anyone’s health care provider. The government provides insurance through Medicare and Medicaid. It helps to fund Community Health Centers which, in turn, provide health care. But, this canard about “government-run health care” is a lie. A simple, fat, ugly lie. Leave it to the American Catholic to trumpet this woman’s bona fides for Congress.