An incendiary political mailer that went out last week from Rep. Marsha Looper’s campaign depicts her opponent in a coming Republican primary, House Majority Leader Amy Stephens, as a supporter of President Barack Obama.
Nearly half the mailer is a photo of Obama campaigning, surrounded by his 2008 campaign slogan, “Change we need!” Next to the president is a photo of Stephens, R-Monument, pointing suggestively to the photo of Obama.
The caption of the photo is “Obama’s Change! Amy’s Exchange! Government Controlled Health Care.”
The front page of the mailer reads, “Take back control of your health care! Rep. Marsha Looper has adamantly opposed Obamacare — ‘Amycare’ — and will continue to fight on behalf of the citizens of HD 19 to repeal these deplorable policies and to defend our health care decisions!”
According to a campaign worker, the mailer went out on Jan. 13, to GOP primary voters from 2010.
Stephens and Looper are locked in a contentious primary for HD 19, since Stephens was displaced by new legislative maps drawn last year and moved from HD 20 to HD 19, held by Looper since 2006.
Stephens has been targeted by many conservatives for carrying a bill last year that created health care exchanges in Colorado. Opponents dubbed the measure, Senate Bill 200, “Amycare,” and argue that it implements national health care policy Republicans despise. The bill, which was supported by many other Republicans as well as Democrats, was cheered by much of the business community.
To view the mailer click here: LR_Looper Postcard-1
Comment from Stephens and Looper soon. Check Second Reading for updates.
This issue should be debated between the two publicly perhaps at GOP headquarters with a neutral mediator asking both the same questions. The voters should hear the debated points so as to educate themselves more on this very sensitive issue. Our future depends on us being able keep our liberties not entangling ourselves with Federal goverment mandates or new changes that take away from the free market. Just a thought.
In today’s Republican Party, when you do the right thing, they bring out the circular firing squad.
ACA is the law. You may not like it, but it’s the law.
Health care exchanges are a Republican idea to promote competition and efficiency in the market. Competition and efficiency are good. If Colorado does nothing, then the federal government will set up and run exchanges for the state. Thus, Amy Stephens, along with the Colorado business community, sought to implement the ACA in a way that works best for Colorado.
For this, she’s attacked by Marsha Looper and the Tea Party. Apparently, they would prefer to have the federal government run Colorado’s health care exchange under federal rules, rather than have the state run its own exchange under its own rules.
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