More government sleaze

I wrote the following letter to my senators and reps about the attempt to ram mental health parity through with the economy bailout bill. What the two have to do with one another, I don't know. It just seems that some Congressmen will use any excuse to push their insane agendas -- I guess what they can't win in the court of public opinion, they'll try to get through under the cover of a national crisis.

Here's my letter:

News reports indicate that Mental Health Parity has been stuffed into the economic bail-out bill.

WHEN WILL CONGRESS GET AN OUNCE OF INTEGRITY AND STOP SLEAZING CONTROVERSIAL THINGS THROUGH BY BURYING THEM IN OTHER ISSUES?

Right now Congress is under scrutiny to do the right thing. In this moment of intense scrutiny and national crisis, it should make a least an attempt to climb out of the gutter.

Mental health parity is a bad idea, is controversial, has broad and credible opposition and will cost businesses and the taxpayer alike. It should die a deserved death.

But apparently, Congress doesn't take the national economic crisis seriously enough to deal with it head-on; instead it is used as an opportunity to get through pork-barrel for an industry (Big Pharma and psychiatry) which itself is under attack.

Please quit playing around -- get mental health parity and any other pork and sleaze out of the economic bail-out and deal with the issue to hand.

And, by the way, I don't think the economic bail-out has had enough study. It should NOT be passed now until we have had a chance to examine the current problem and the proposed solution thoroughly.