Extremist 'Tea Party' Republicans like to pretend they are patriots --- so much so that when Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) complained this week that the government shutdown he helped engineer had forced the elimination of Veteran's Administration healthcare services, he belatedly discovered that he had painted himself into an impossible corner.

Well, he didn't discover it on his own. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) helped him to notice that he was ardently advocating on the Senate floor for the Veteran's Administration health care system, which, unlike "ObamaCare", is an actual government run healthcare system of the type that Cruz pretends to abhor so much he was willing to lead his party to shutting down the entire government to block it.

"I just wanted to be clear," Stabenow asked Cruz during his floor speech advocating re-opening the VA as part of the GOP's desperate effort to re-open only those parts of government they approve, "Because the Senator from Texas has, in fact, made the ending of a private sector, competitive health care system for up to 30 million Americans part of what he wants to stop. I just wanted to be clear that the fully government-funded, government-run --- with government doctors --- system through the Veteran's Administration system is something that you are advocating we continue to fund through the federal government?"

Cruz couldn't say much more in response than: "The answer is yes. I believe we should fully fund the VA." (Full video here.)

Unlike "Obamacare", a private health insurance operation merely overseen by the government, the VA healthcare system that Cruz was advocating for, actually is a full-blown, government-run healthcare system. Or, as the heroic Republicans now like to deride it: A government takeover of healthcare!

Actual heroes, on the other hand, like Redge Ranyard, who fought against Nazis during World War II, are less than impressed by the claims made by Republicans like Cruz and House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) that they are locked in an "epic battle" to save the nation...

Should be a fun month. Sigh...

[Hat-tip longtime BRAD BLOG Toon Sherpa Pokey Anderson]