Yesterday, we took time away from the Internets (that cherished series of pipes, tubes, and expressways for dumptrucks), to go off to some of our favorite spots in Chicago, sit quietly, and think. We spent most of the day in the Lurie Garden at Millennium Park, in a hidden nook near the shoulder hedge, looking at the new Modern wing of the Art Institute in the distance, watching little rabbits playing in the yellowed Karl Forrester grasses and remaining thistles and other prairie plantings the garden’s known for.  We needed that time to contemplate the enormity of the situation that faces us, because after this week, our lives are just not going to ever be the same again. 

We had a similiar crisis of faith and conscience a decade or so ago, when a good friend of ours, who we’ll call Zack, accidentally killed another driver when, after too many beers, he ran a stop sign late one night.  Zack’s a good guy, and he had been a friend since childhood.  He never was someone we’d consider a drunk, and was in college at the time, home on break and having some fun (too much fun), but he should have known better than getting behind the wheel of that car. Zack’s parents were rich, and he’d always had pretty much anything he ever wanted.  We’d seen him drive recklessly before — but not drunk — and actually stopped riding with him, because he took too many chances, and played it too fast, too loose.  We knew things would catch up with him one day, and tried to stop that from happening.  When he had his car accident, in which he got banged up really bad and the other driver lost his life, it caught up with him worse than we could have ever imagined. 

His parents, of course, funded an expensive defense, and we were torn as to whether we should blindly stand with our friend of many years, even when he was in the wrong and caused so much destruction, or whether we should tell Zack he needed to suffer the consequences for his actions.  The lawyers Zack’s parents hired asked some of us to give character statements talking about how responsible Zack was, and we agonized over the request.  Just like yesterday in the Lurie Garden, we found someplace quiet where we could stop and think, and spent a few days trying to decide what to do.  Never in our lives had we ever said no to a friend in need — but we couldn’t lie in those statements, pretending Zack was a model citizen, when we knew for years something terrible would come from his behavior.  We’d, in fact, tried to stop it by cajoling him to change his behavior, but he wouldn’t listen.  In the aftermath of the accident, we just could not write endorsements for him that would gloss over all the reckless things he’d done that we were painfully aware of.  We told his parents and lawyers that if they wanted statements from us, they’d have to be truthful: they would, in fact, detail Zack’s bad driving, how loud he played his radio in the car, how he talked on his phone while driving, how he ate in the car not paying attention to the road most of the time, how he speeded everywhere he went, how we’d seem him drive after a few drinks before (but, honestly, never did see him drunk, in which case we would have wrestled him to the ground and taken his keys away if he insisted on driving), etc.  

His parents were furious with us, and it ended our friendship with him. They found other people, various relatives, employees of the family company, church members, etc. to write those letters, but we just in good faith could not support Zack’s defense when we didn’t think he had a leg to stand on:  we wanted him to come forward, take responsibility for what he had done, suffer the consequences, do his time, and then emerge on the other side of this ordeal changed for the better with his demons exorcised.  

This is exactly how we are feeling today about the 60 Democrats in the Senate who are voting to ram through the single worst piece of legislation in our nation’s history. 

The majority of those 60 people are Senators we’ve supported most of our adult lives.  We have pictures on our walls of us with many of these people.  Barbra Mikulski, Joe Lieberman, Roland Burris, and Evan Bayh are personal favorites. It is agonizing to think of a future screeching towards us where we would want to see any of them booted from office — but if they indeed vote to pass the Utopiacare bill, that’s exactly how we will feel.  We just cannot ever again support a Senator who votes for this monstrosity…any more than we could have written those character statements for someone whose character we couldn’t defend in his circumstances. 

Let us be crystal clear here:  it is a sign of gross incompetence and willful dereliction of duty on the part of an elected official to ram through world-changing legislation without reading it, giving it careful debate, considering the will and wished of constituents, and moving in a judicious and financially prudent manner with future ramifications always in mind. 

From where we sit, whoever votes Yes on Utopiacare in the mad dash to force this through by Christmas deserves to be thrown kicking and screaming from office.  

We will personally devote the next six years to making sure we do whatever we can to boot all 60 of these Democrats from the Senate, should they vote Yes and ram this monstrous legislation through.  That means having to work against people we like, and a few we genuinely love.  That breaks our hearts.  It really is like having to stand on our principles and refuse to write those character statements for Zach, knowing we’d have to lie to give his lawyers what they needed.  We just couldn’t do that, and we just can’t ever support any Senator who passes the Utopiacare bill.  

EVERY one of these people is that 60th vote that passes the bill.  Every last one of them is the reason this will be inflicted upon us.  Every last one of them deserves to be defeated at the first available opportunity. 

We won’t even get into the merits of healthcare reform here…because the problem we have with the actions of this Senate is on a much more basic level.  The reason we are so furious is because these Senators should never pass ANY bill that’s been handled in the manner in which Harry Reid orchestrated Utopiacare in the Senate. 

ANY Senator should lose his or her job if he or she: 

* Votes Yes on a large spending bill without actually reading it

* Votes Yes on a bill that’s not even written, so there’s no way of knowing what’s in it

* Votes Yes on a bill that the public does not want and ample evidence suggests needs more thought and consideration before action should be taken

* Votes Yes on something of dramatic national importance just to adhere to an arbitrary political timetable

* Votes against the will of the people

* Votes in the face of common sense

We’ve personally decided the vote on Utopiacare will be a Before/After moment in our lives.  Political allegiances for us will change when the final votes on this is taken.  People we long supported will become people we work hard to defeat in their next elections, because we will no longer believe those people to be fit to hold national office.  The Utopiacare bill is the single worst piece of legislation the United States Senate has ever produced.  It should be defeated, and healthcare reform should start at square one, page one, this time with the considered debate it deserves, respecting the will of the American people, with politics left outside the chamber and the best interests of all Americans as the driving force. 

This legislation is economy-altering, jobs-killing, and world-changing.  It is not a vote to name a new post office after someone.  It’s not a vote to declare some obscure person a hero.  It is not one of the mindless pieces of legislation that can be rushed through the Senate before a holiday. Healthcare reform is not something that should be treated like this, handled so sloppily, and done so recklessly.  

We are beyond disgusted by the behavior of every Democrat in the Senate right now. 

Every one of those 60 people has the chance to stop this bill so things can start over and it can be done correctly.  

All 60 have the choice to make:  politics, or the best interests of the American people. 

If they choose to hold the party line and do what Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Dr. Utopia want and not what the American people want them to do, then we want nothing more to do with them — and look forward to calling all of them “ex-Senator” at the first available opportunity. 

We do not think we’ve ever been this angry about anything.  

We’re stunned — STUNNED — we feel so passionate about this that we will actually start opposing and working against people we’ve admired for years, but just like with our friend Zack, if they really go ahead and do this, they will cross a line with us from which there is no going back. 

Many of you asked where we stood on this, so there’s your answer.  

Once the die is cast with this, all previous bets will squarely be off.