Senator Kirk: "I've got mine...you're on your own

Today's email from my Senator Mark Kirk (Rep. IL) titled "In case you missed it...Mark Kirk: The Senator's Comeback" on CBS Sunday Morning was not needed as I saw the piece in real time. What is troubling about the Senator's otherwise remarkable recovery from a devastating January, 2012 stroke is that he has learned nothing about the need to provide a semblance of the million dollar plus health care, and year long salary continuation that facilitated his recovery, to the tens of millions without such support. When asked if the largesse that fueled his comeback made him reconsider his opposition to Obamacare and extension of unemployment to the chronically unemployed, Kirk replied, "No...I'm still a fiscal conservative...and we cannot afford it". What Kirk didn't say is that we can afford trillion dollar senseless and failed wars in the Middle East, every dollar of which he's voted for since entering Congress in 2001.

While Kirk offers his inspirational recovery as a lesson to the 800,000 annual US stroke victims, he continues the despicable and unconscionable refusal to help the truly less fortunate whose lives are destroyed by a cruel and heartless nation that only has money to prop up their fading world empire Kirk swore allegiance to when first elected to Congress. If he really wants to be an inspiration to these tens of millions, he should give up his lucrative salary and his endless medical health care benefits and then try to fully recover.

I thought that Kirk's stroke and recovery would free him from the evil greed that prevents his party from cooperating even one iota in building a fairer, more just society. Kirk's story is just another example of his political credo: "I've got mine...you're on your own".