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Mindless partisanship has replaced principled conservatism. What passes for principle in the party these days is “what can we do to screw the Democrats today.”

...I will know that the party is on the path to recovery when someone in a position of influence reaches out to former Republicans like me. We are the most likely group among independents to vote Republican. But I see no effort to do so. All I see is pandering to the party’s crazies like the birthers.

"Al-Zeidi's shoes were a suitable farewell for Bush's deeds in Iraq," Sunni lawmaker Dhafir al-Ani said in welcoming the early release. "Al-Zeidi's act expressed the real will and feelings of the Iraqi people. His anger against Bush was the result of the suffering of his countrymen."

"Within a week after Labor Day there will be a hearing... so in early September," Meghan Bartley, legislative aide of the state's committee on election, told AFP.

"They have to figure out if they will change the current law.  Every member of (Massachusetts) House and Senate will attend the hearing."

The original clip shows me discussing the concerns of a mother (Brittany Kraft) who lives in the 22nd Congressional District of Texas. This mother came to earlier town hall meetings that I held to express her concerns with me that if the proposed government option were in place her son might not have been born.

Once I raised this point, several people responded without allowing me the opportunity to make clear her concerns. The person who made the clip that is being circulated shamelessly accused me of exploiting a child to make a political point.

Aside from this reprehensible accusation, the facts are not made clear in the blogs circulating the story.

Excerpt from a blog posting:

OLSON: Britney is convinced that her son would not have been born if there was a public option. She wouldn’t have had the choices to be able to go find a doctor she wants. […] For those of you who say it’s not true, don’t talk to me, talk to Britney.

ATTENDEE 1: That’s not true!

ATTENDEE 2: The insurance company turned her down, not the government! The private insurance turned her down, not the government! My gosh! … That’s not the government!

I did not claim that her insurance denied care for her child. Nor did I say the government denied her any care. I simply stated that doctors at the time did not feel that her baby could be treated and recommended termination of the pregnancy. Brittany was not willing to accept that as the only option, so she sent fetal echocardiograms to specialists across the country and was able to find a doctor who could assist with the birth and treatment of her son, which included a heart transplant when he was less than three weeks old.

Her private insurance did cover the costs for all of the procedures she needed and she now has a wonderful 7-year-old son who is still under medical care for the immunosuppressive treatments that accompany an organ transplant.

Brittany Kraft’s concern (and she has been reading H.R. 3200 page by page herself) is that a government run plan might take the advice of the doctors in Texas and decide not to cover the care she received.

That was my point and her point as well. It is not only important to me to set the record straight with respect to the truth about my position on a family’s personal story, but also to illustrate the deep concerns that millions of Americans have with respect to who will be making the decisions about our quality of care.

When people engage in this debate it is critically important to be truthful and accurate when relaying the facts.

Below is a direct memo written by Brittany Kraft to my office, outlining her concerns with a government run health care option.

Here's the short of Josh's story as it relates to the current healthcare debate (as told by his mother, Brittany):

When I was 24 weeks pregnant, my unborn child was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. The only options I was given by network (San Antonio) doctors were to go to the hospital when I stopped feeling kicks for 12 hours OR to put the child to sleep in utero (terminating the pregnancy), and go to the hospital for a stillbirth.

I found the 5 best pediatric cardio-thoracic surgeons I could find online & sent videotapes of the fetal echocardiograms. One came back saying what I needed to hear - "if you come here to have him, we'll do everything we can to save him." That was Dr. Ed Bove at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. I contacted my insurance company (then United Healthcare) and they offered to cover all costs since there was no care offered for my child in network. Josh received a successful heart transplant when he was 19 days old at the University of Michigan, Mott Hospital

Josh is now 7 years old and FULL of energy, you would never know of any of his setbacks to look at him. President Obama, in addressing concerned senior citizens, said that the government did not want to make health care decisions. The caveat that he did NOT mention, was that while the care the patient WANTS will still be available to them, thus allowing the patient to make the decision, the government may opt NOT to cover it because they do not deem it to be the best path forward. NO bureaucrat would have approved the cost of Joshua's care in Michigan when all network doctors said the child would never be born alive.

While some may say I can stay on my private plan so that government will NOT get involved in Josh's healthcare, they are not considering the far reaching implications of the government plan. If government implements a plan where they can call the shots, private insurers will have to follow suit to remain competitive. Otherwise, healthy people flock to the government plan, which is cheaper, and sick people stay on private plans, putting private insurers out of business.

While Josh has received his heart and is doing well, this issue is still of great concern to me. What do I do when the government or my insurer decides that the medication that has been protecting his heart for the past 7 years is not the most cost effective? What do I do when Josh needs care to bridge him to another surgery or another heart transplant? While I will still have the ABILITY to make the necessary decisions, it will be cost prohibitive if the government or the insurer chooses not to cover it.

I delivered a speech on the House floor that further outlines the issue that can be found here .

What do you say?

Congressman Olson represents Texas' 22nd congressional district.

"The EPA doesn't have the manpower to implement the regulations the way they would have to be," Heritage Foundation's senior policy analyst in energy economics and climate change, David Kreutzer, reported to Fox News.

Kreutzer also warns that new regulations are likely to trigger a flood of new lawsuits and flood businesses with loads of paperwork. 

Not even the official stamp store attached to the Smithsonian's National Postal Museum - which celebrates the ability of mailmen to deliver to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and to the front lines during wartime, and which has a vault system to handle the valuable bulk quantities of stamps - could spare 3,000 44-cent stamps.

Not a square to spare.

Why? According to some of the counter staff, there is a new district manager overseeing post offices in our area. This manager is setting a limit on how many stamps any one post office can have at any one time. Therefore, area post offices are being forced to ration their stamps. If we bought 3,000 at this point, there might not be enough left later for other customers.

So the U.S. Postal Service turned away our business for lack of resources.

Q: How will U.S. Sen. (Edward) Kennedy's death affect things?
A: I think it's going to help us. He hasn't been around for some time. We're going to have a new chairman of that committee, it'll be, I don't know for sure, but I think Sen. (Chris) Dodd, (D-Conn.). He has a right to take it. Either him or (U.S. Sen. Tom) Harkin, (D-Iowa), whichever one wants it can have it. I think he (Kennedy) will be a help. He's an inspiration for us. That was the issue of his life and he didn't get it done.

For one thing I think the American people have seen the wrongness of trying to interrupt meetings and yell and scream at people. That's lost a lot of its pizzazz. I think its given time for members to contemplate what's important. We can talk to our constituents. I've traveled the state talking to people. I think they've been very constructive meetings.